Odds, Ends and Bullshit

  

                      Odds and Ends

 

    A recent meme from a conservative news site states a bill introduced in the House of Representatives would allow undocumented immigrants to receive stimulus checks as part of the CARES Act. This has also been picked up by the Trump campaign as if it was Joe Biden’s initiative. As is almost always the case with Trump, this is as much a matter of what isn’t said than what is.  Another example of this later.

        Without an information overload, here, as Paul Harvey famously said is “The rest of the story:

        As enacted, the CARES Act (first round of stimulus money) required recipients of benefits to provide a valid Social Security number, which undocumented immigrants don’t have and can't legally get. This, by definition, eliminated undocumented persons who have no SSAN but do have a Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN) and who pay income tax.  Many undocumented immigrants pay taxes because it’s legally required and because their history of tax payment may in some cases be used to strengthen their cases for citizenship. Proposed second round Pandemic relief legislation would provide stimulus money to anyone who filed an income tax return or was Social Security eligible. This meant anyone who had a work income or filed for income tax credit and has a SSAN got a check.

        Don’t let the Trump fog of partial truth fool you. This means that undocumented individuals who work with     an ITIN have income tax deducted from their pay checks, as well as Social Security/Medicare withholding which will never be paid back to them until such time as they become citizens. Undocumented immigrants contributed over $13 billion into the Social Security funds in 2016 and $3 billion to Medicare.

        Understand what that means: there are folks here who work and pay taxes who see fewer of the benefits of doing so. These are the persons in question. American businesses hire them, withhold income tax and Social Security/Medicare taxes yet they would receive no stimulus money even though others, working or not, deserving or not, do. Check almost any Florida roofing crew. The employer is required to withhold FICA, but there is no such thing as a “personal” SS/Medicare account, because Social Security does not create an individual savings account for each worker that pays FICA tax, the government uses any money it receives to pay benefits to current recipients of Social Security.

       Yeah, as stated earlier, in some cases this means working individuals who pay into SS/Medicare and get nothing back, would also be denied stimulus money while citizens who choose not to work (yes there are some (too) many of those) will get a check. Now you know the rest of the story.

 

        In another “You really can’t make this shit up” moment, we’re resented with what we suspected – that the “stable genius” isn’t much of a business genius. NY Times released the news that Donald Trump paid no personal income tax in 10 of the previous 15 years, and just $750 per in the several before being elected President. Other details from the Times initial article mention the massive debt and imminent insolvency. No surprise there; Trump has failed thus 6 times previously.  Trump hates WaPo owner Jeff Bezos, whose corporation paid $162 million in federal taxes last year, not including his annual $1 billion investment in Blue Horizon – space research which benefits NASA. 

        Why so little for Amazon? Ask Trump, which tax “reduction” bill was a love letter to businessmen like Bezos, who, as expected, take advantage of such legislation,  but more desperately to the point, to the struggling Trump Organization. Trump is heavily leveraged, and most US commercial banks won’t lend any more. (“Rage”, Bob Woodward).

        As expected, Trump’s mouthpiece du jour led the bucket brigade, announcing that Trump had “paid millions in federal tax.” The “deplorables” are expected to accept that at face value as vindication. To that end, Trump immediately resorted to his favorite shibboleth “Fake News.”

        For the rest of the literati, here's the truth. Yes, the Trump Organization sent a lot of money to the Federal government. Of course, they had, to since with 22,450 employees (2015 numbers) they sent a lot of those damned “payroll tax” dollars to Washington. Trump wants you to believe that is “personal tax”. It isn’t. It’s a business expense and not so surprisingly, one which Trump has tried by executive order to minimize by “suspending” and (he hopes, and has said so) eventually permanently reducing, payroll tax. These are what that FICA line on the paycheck means, and are part of what the Republicans like to call “entitlements.”  This is code for “what we wealthy cats will never need so why should we pay into it?”      

        You know - Medicare/Medicaid/Social Security? In an America where somewhere between 60% and 70% of retirees acknowledge that Social Security and Medicare are essential to that retirement, it should surprise few of us that those who assail the system are those who will soar above it with private monies. 

         So, in summary, when Trump asserts that “he” pays lots of taxes, he’s lying by omission. That omission is that the taxes in question are paid on others’ behalf  and the employer portion of FICA is a deductible expense for businesses. (not to mention that not paying it is a criminal offence.) Add to this, the fact that when Don Jr, and “Forrest” Trump travel on Trump Organization business, their security (just 2 of 18 individuals related to Trump for whose security we foot the bill) is not reimbursed to the Federal Government by the Trump Organization. Remember, these are adults doing private business on public money. This is in addition to the room rents paid to Trump properties for Secret service individuals. Can we say, “conflict of interests?”  

       Finally, and a personal opinion: Warren Zevon was an under-appreciated artist. Looking at his lyrics in some cases is reminiscent of Dylan (Bob, not Thomas), ‘Hold Me in Your Heart” is a masterpiece. “Werewolves of London” is a freak anthem and “Poor, Poor, Pitiful Me” so good that Jackson Browne and Linda Ronstadt both covered it. Do your ears a favor and take a while and listen to Warren’s best album, “Excitable Boy” and then branch out. Dead of mesothelioma at 56, Warren Zevon was gone too soon, like Dan Fogleberg, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Marvin Gaye, Jimi, Lennon and too many others. And on that rather mournful note, I do believe that’s all I have to say about that.

Democratic Socialism, Separating Myth From Reality

 

        The United States—like almost every other country with an advanced economy, such as the U.K., Germany, France, and Japan—is already a partially socialist country, with a mixed economy and many government programs that serve the public good. Note however that this is “socialism” with a small “s.”  Democratic socialism is far less about limiting opportunity than many think, and more about simply determining and establishing a reasonable and equitable  definition of what constitutes basic human needs.  By this definition, Social Security is a socialist program: it's a government-run pension system that cuts out private money managers. Medicare - a single-payer, government-run health insurance program for those over 65 - is too. Medicare-For-All would simply extend this to the rest of the population.

        The minimum wage, maximum hour, and child labor laws that go back over a century are likewise "socialist" programs, in that the government intervenes in the capitalist market to require employers to meet minimum standards that might not be met in a pure, unregulated “free” market.

        Agricultural and energy subsidies, both, oddly enough favorites of many Republicans, including members of both the House and the Senate who get farm subsidies, are also a form of socialist programs. Unlike Robin Hood, however these are a concentrated form of "take from everyone and give to the rich." Likewise, the government’s crop insurance program is more of the same. Direct farm aid has climbed each year of Trump’s presidency, from $11.5 billion in 2017 to more than $32 billion this year — an all-time high. The USDA is paying farmers roughly twice as much as the actual harm that they suffered from the Trump incited tariff/trade war. And the payments are based on production; the bigger the farm, the bigger the payments. Thousands of farmers got more than $100,000 each. According to an NPR analysis of USDA records of payments made through July 2019, 100,000 individuals collected just over 70% of the money. Thirty-three members of Congress and their immediate family members collected at least $15.3 million in farm subsidies over the past 10 years. On the other hand, only two, both Senators, are actually working farmers. The rest are essentially simply collecting a “return on investment.” The “shadiest” part? Although current year’s payouts ($32 billion, remember) exceeds the USDA budget by over $8 billion, Congress rarely even discusses the extra expenditure of public monies to a select few. Where’s the Republican outrage? Begin with the fact that this particular form of wealth redistribution tends to favor “red state” endeavors.

        Stripped of the Red-baiting and name-calling, the real debate isn’t between capitalism vs. socialism, but about the appropriate balance between the two.

        Conservatives want to reduce Social Security and Medicare benefits and reduce the numbers who qualify, while progressives want to increase and expand these programs.  Many progressives want to move towards a Medicare system covering all Americans, not just those over 65 (“Medicare for All”) while centrist Democrats want to protect the ACA which is a hybrid between private insurance and government insurance and regulation, and conservatives want to go back to the all-private system which pre-dated the ACA.

         It is worthy of note that the first US President to actively discuss and promote universal health care was Theodore Roosevelt! (A Republican, although except for shared white superiority views, Trump wouldn’t recognize that). Again, in the “what they don’t know” category, is the fact that historically, “for profit” heath care is a relatively new concept. For profit health insurance truly began during and after WWII, and was more formalized by the Health Maintenance Organization Act of 1973. Today's truly astronomical drug company profits are relatively recent, as well.

    Both are the results of successful Conservative attempts to enable the private generation of profit from the unfortunate medical circumstances of others, which shouldn’t be revenue sources, but basic rights of citizens. The vast bulk of civilized nations of the world recognize this as a basic fact.

        The government already supports higher education, grants, and scholarships to a fair extent, (that’s socialism) but progressives want to make a public college education free or debt-free.  Conservatives support government subsidies for agriculture and the oil energy (that’s also a form socialism) while many progressives believe, as do I, (discussed above) that this is “reverse welfare” for the rich.

        Under the headline, "Most Young Americans Prefer Socialism to Capitalism" CNBC reported on a Gallup poll this summer showing that millennials are more favorable to the socialist side than the capitalist side of the equation. with 51% having a positive view of socialism and only 47% having a positive view of capitalism.

Lost in the fog of partisan bickering are two basic truths:

·       The United States has, and has had, for over 100 years, social programs and ideas which are socialist in nature. Even such things as Fire departments, roads, snow clearing, levees on rivers, etc. are instances of public money spent to benefit all the population. The fact that private interests and capital continue to be the business models for most goods and services is why it’s properly called Democratic Socialism. It can be, and is being argued that such things as producing cars, farming and, in fact, the vast bulk of consumer goods which are purchased with discretionary spending should be privately financed and produced. No sane US politician has opined otherwise.

However, it can also be argued that such universally necessary modern necessities as Electrical Power should be produced by centrally owned and operated  entities without a profit motive. Actually,  many developed nations have nationally owned power prediction facilities, but others use privately owned systems. There is some form of government oversight or control in almost all, regardless of public or private status. In truth, in the US, Public Utilities Commissions who regulate and approve rates for these privately owned and operated utilities are a hybrid approach to this issue and have been in place, working as designed, for decades, as have most state insurance regulators.

 

·       The second and sad point is that the bulk of those who flock to the banner of “No Socialism” have essentially no awareness or understanding of the things discussed in the preceding paragraphs. They have been fed a diet of “Socialism is Communism” for about a hundred years.

     Trump’s false proclamation that America “will never be a socialist country” is simply an attempt to resurrect the post-war McCarthyite red-baiting of his childhood (Trump’s first personal “fixer” Roy Cohn, was also Joe McCarthy’s legal hit man) in order to put his thumb on the capitalist side of the scale favored by the oligarchs in the ongoing debate over how much socialism and America should have.

        Truth told, it is impossible to over-exaggerate the chaos and misery which would ensue if all the things which are produced, provided, or regulated in the public interest (you know, like socialism) were to evaporate, This is why it makes me cringe, to see a MAGA hat wearing, over 65, person, since the vast percentage of them happily cash Social Security checks every month and use some form of Medicare.   

        There are those who insist that this isn’t “true” socialism a la Marx and Engels. Of course, it isn’t and no one with a brain has suggested that it is, although several have been blamed for it. Marx and Engels theorized about State Socialism (Communism) in which the state owns or controls everything. On a sliding scale of political theory with Fascism far right end and Communism on the far left, Democratic Socialism is just a bit left of center. Unregulated Free Market Capitalism (essentially Oligarchy) of the sort John Stossel (and to a significant degree, Donald Trump) advocates is farther right of center than Democratic Socialism is to the left.

        Let’s look at definitions:

Fascism: far-right, authoritarian ultranationalism characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition and strong regimentation of society and of the economy which came to prominence in early 20th-century Europe.

Communism: A philosophical, social, political, economic ideology and movement whose ultimate goal is the establishment of a communist society, namely a socioeconomic order structured upon the ideas of common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social classes, money and the state.

        I would point out that, for the average citizen, if you go far enough Right, conditions will be just about the same as if you go far enough Left. The extremes of both deny personal freedoms, that’s why I generally represent the political spectrum as a circle, not as a line from left to right. In fact, wartime Italians under Mussolini were little better off than wartime Russians under Stalin. Both had dictatorial leaders and little freedom for citizens. Finally, consider how easily Vladimir Putin was able to move Russia from what is was to the Oligarchy it has become. When participative government falls victim to absolutist “lifetime leaders,” such as Kim, Putin or Saudi princes, all of whose power Trump admires, and has said so, bad things happen, and the people bear the brunt of it.   

"Whaddabout?"

 

Trump alleges ‘left-wing indoctrination’ in schools, says he will create national commission to push more ‘pro-American’ history

        I received an e-mail from a friend, a conservative, who regularly forwards “stuff” to me, sometimes without reading. This is a US Military O-6 reserve retiree who was an executive with a major national corporation, and we are good friends. But…In my world, you own what you forward unless it is as an example with which you differ.  I responded to most of the verbiage in the e-mail and was going to leave it at that, and then today I read the above headline from the Washington Post.

        First, however the e-mail: It was, generally a “whaddabout” apologia for slavery, or more specifically, reading between the lines, a minimalization of the bad/discriminatory treatment of Blacks today, based on the fact that there has been such treatment in the past. (a “Whaddabout” is the logically flawed but too frequently used application of the non-theory that if someone else does a thing, it creates the idea that “Well then I can do it to,”  as in if you get caught robbing a bank, a line of defense would be to tell the judge “Oh yeah? but Whaddabout John Dillinger”)

        More bizarre, it condemned several current political figures because of events generations ago. It also reverts to the old, lame excuse that some few blacks had owned slaves which, by some unfathomable twist of illogic, either makes today’s Blacks complicit or excuses Whites.  This is somewhat akin to saying “Jeffrey Dahmer, a White guy, ate people, therefore all White people are cannibals.”

        The political and more specifically, racial, bias inherent in the e-mail can be shown from just a few of the “bullet point” statements therein I’ll note the ones worthy of response”

Beginning of e-mail:

“True” History of Slavery

“True” story of slavery, and reminders of how easy it is to "revise" it. And the last comment says it all.

They do not have, and do not want any perspective because it is all just political for them.

Blacks were not enslaved because they were black, but because they were available.

Slavery has existed in the world for thousands of years.

Whites enslaved whites in Europe for centuries before the first black was brought to the Western hemisphere 

Asians enslaved Europeans.

Asians enslaved other Asians.

Africans enslaved other Africans and even today, in North Africa blacks continue to enslave other blacks. Slavery has existed since the Old Testament Biblical times.

The remainder will be addressed individually, my comments in bold italics”

Of course, the above historical statements are true, but it’s a giant “But Whaddabout.”  But then, the Bible also speaks of selling one’s daughter into slavery, but for White Southerners that only applied to Black slaves’ daughters!

A bit of history that is conveniently ignored; between 1500 and the 1860s at least 12 million Africans were brought to the ‘New World’ of the Americas.

 (This is never in my experience as a history teacher “ignored.” In fact, this is an unqualified lie)

Of these 12 million forced into slavery, less than 500,000 were brought to North America. The remaining 2,500,000 Africans went to South America and the Caribbean. By the mid-1600s Europeans were outnumbered by Africans in cities such as Mexico City, Havana, and Lima.

 So, Spaniards and Caribbean Brits also were slavers? And…?

A few more historical facts: (facts?)

1. The first legal slave owner in American history was a black tobacco farmer named Anthony Johnson.

 Blatantly skewed and false in implication:  Johnson was sold as an indentured servant to a white planter named Bennet to work on his Virginia tobacco farm In 1621. By this time Blacks had been in Jamestown for several years, at first as indentured servants. 14 years later, he paid off his indenture and bought 5 more indentured Black servants including his own son! This was to enable himself to obtain land from colonial authorities. in 1640 one if his indentures sued him for his freedom, and the courts ruled him (the servant) a slave for life. Of course, we can speculate on the morality of Johnson’s owning “slaves” but it, in no sense, makes slavery a moral institution, it’s just another Whaddabout?  

 

2. South Carolina’s largest slave holder in 1860 was a black plantation owner named William Ellison. Simply put – a lie. As one of South Carolina’s 900 free Blacks, Ellison owned 37 slaves, at most, and his son eventually owned 19. Meanwhile Joshua John Ward, of Georgetown County, South Carolina, was the largest American slaveholder, dubbed "the king of the rice planters". In 1850 he held 1,092 slaves; Ward was the largest slaveholder in the United States during his lifetime. In 1860 his estate held 1,130 or 1,131 slaves. 1130 is a larger number than 37. The original statement is wrong by a factor of 3300%!

 

3. American Indians owned thousands of black slaves.

And? another Whaddabout? Is slavery somehow more palatable or morally justified because of this? The indigenous peoples of North America had utilized a form of captive-taking and involuntary labor long before European contact. But this form of bondage was not either trans-generational or permanent. (nor was it based in an assumption of racial inferiority) Captive-taking was most often used to replace a dead loved one within the family with a new person. The captive would then take on this deceased person's sexual or labor-related capacities.

Strictly as an aside, the Five “Civilized” Tribes tried hard to adapt to “the white man’s ways” to retain some hold on ancestral lands, In the case of the Choctaw, Creeks, Chickasaw and Cherokees, and Seminoles   this included building and living in permanent settlements, farming, raising livestock, and, lamentably, using slaves. These slaves were taken to Indian territory (on the Trail of Tears) and declared freedmen and tribal members by Law. Sadly, the Five Nations tribes unlike most other “relocated” tribes attempted to remove these non-Indian folks from tribal status. (and the rights attached to that status) The descendants of these former slaves fought back, filing several lawsuits. On August 31, 2017, the descendants of people enslaved by members of the Cherokee Nation were victorious. The US District Court in Washington ruled that these descendants should have citizenship rights in the Cherokee Nation. So, what’s the takeaway here? Primarily that not only Whites can be racist in action.  

4. In 1830 there were 3,775 free black people who owned 12,740 black slaves.

And? Just another Whaddabout?

 5. Many black slaves were allowed to hold jobs, own businesses, and own real estate.

Even though free people of color were able to purchase real property in the South, their numbers were few and many states erected barriers that either prohibited land ownership by African Americans or imposed strict limitations on their ability to purchase real property. In the absence of de jure (by law) restrictions, there were de facto (in reality) impediments that came in the form of violence against African Americans who either made land purchases or attempted to make such purchases and the outright refusal by Whites to sell land to them. "A slave may, by the consent of his master, acquire and hold personal property. All, thus acquired, is regarded in law as that of the master." This S.C. law about sums up the gist of how wrong this initial statement is. Yes, slaves were at times hired out to others, but wages were the owners’ to allot or not. Slaves (not freemen) did not and could not own land by law. Of course, since the real issue here is the attempt to somehow diminish the essentially immoral and evil nature of slavery, the writer omitted the term “Free Persons” (who could with the above noted impediments and incumbrances, own land and run a business.

6. Brutal black on black slavery was common in Africa for thousands of years.

The article referenced for this statement is a scholarly historical analysis of slavery which never uses the word “Brutal” to describe African slavery except as it applied to the Arabs who bought and mistreated Black Africans. In fact, Africans who took captives and sold them as slaves were in their eyes selling persons of another race (tribe). Europeans made it about color, and on that distinction hinged the assumption of racial inferiority. This was nothing new, since Arabs, far ahead of Caucasian Europeans in many areas of math and science by the Renaissance, were also discriminated against on both racial and religious grounds.

         In fact, Africans enslaved by other Africans were not slaves in the same sense as elsewhere. The European form was called chattel slavery. A chattel slave is a piece of property, with no rights. Slavery within Africa was different. A slave might be enslaved in order to pay off a debt or pay for a crime. Slaves in Africa lost the protection of their family and their place in society through enslavement. But eventually they or their children might become part of their master’s family and become free. This was unlike chattel slavery, in which enslaved Africans were slaves for life, as were their children and grandchildren.

 

7. Most slaves brought from Africa to America were purchased from black slave owners.

No shit?

And turning to the present:

 

1. Barack Obama, who has stoked the fires of racial hatred for the last eight years, is the direct paternal descendant of slave owners.

According to the research, one of Obama's great-great-great-great grandfathers, George Washington Overall, owned two slaves who were recorded in the 1850 census in Nelson County, Ky. The same records show that one of Obama's great-great-great-great-great-grandmothers, Mary Duvall, also owned two slaves. So, let’s punish everyone who has an unpleasant fact in their history five generations ago?

The bigger and obviously politically motivated issue here is the claim that Barack Obama “stoked the fires of race hatred..” This blatant lie is code for “I am White and he’s Black and I’m a bigoted racist arsehole.” I’m a pretty perceptive guy and I’m still looking for the “fire stoking” example in Obama’s 8 years.  Oh wait, was it the whole “Cops shouldn’t murder unarmed men with choke holds?”  Who wrote this? Trump's father?  Sadly, it takes far less time to find a ream of Trump examples. This one statement reveals the true intent of their whole screed.  

2. You certainly won't hear CNN's Anderson Cooper mentioning Obama's sordid family history, lest Obama might remind Cooper, the son of heiress Gloria Vanderbilt, that his family also was slave owners:

Sordid family history? Huh? Mitch McConnell only has to go back three generations to find a slave owning forebear, so friggin’ what? We’re responsible for our own actions in the here and now, not the sins of our fathers. And if we acted morally today where race is concerned, none of this would matter.

3. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who found some Lee and Jackson statues to remove from the Empire State, seems to have forgotten New York is named for one of the most notorious slave traders in history, the Duke of York. Better tear down that Big Apple, Andy.

As Physicist and Nobel laureate Wolfgang Pauli once described a truly horrid student effort: The above nonsense is “So bad it isn’t even wrong.”  New York, like Boston, New London, Plymouth, (And the Duke of York’s title etc.) is named for the town in England of the same name, which was established in 71 AD. 

End of e-mail

Before continuing, let’s be clear: This same shitty logic is also used by the offended minority as a rationale for equally stupid statements. One such example is the opinion, which I have seen proffered several times, that because Francis Scott Key was probably a racist, the poem (The Star Spangled Banner) he wrote about an event absolutely devoid of racial content or context -  the British siege of Fort McHenry, on September 14, 1814 – is a “bad/racist/insulting” poem. Sadly, (I think) too many will jump on that bandwagon and claim that the song itself is “racist.” As Dr. Freud said, and I find these words to live by, “Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.”  Another example is the Evangelical “Karens” who saw in “Let It Go,” from Frozen, some sort of devious plot to groom 5-year-old lesbians. (sometimes a great song is just a song)  

        That said, what might “Pro-American history” look like? Coming from Donald Trump, who wasn’t really sure who the contestants were at Normandy or what the significance if the Arizona memorial is, this would be laughable…..if he wasn’t so easily gulled into being the mouthpiece for others, far brighter and even more devious. At least with Trump, the stupidity is so obvious that one can almost dismiss it, but we must remember that he is easily manipulated by those with far more sinister goals.

        Well, maybe Custer wasn’t really a bad guy and incompetent egotist who got most of the 7^th cavalry killed. Or those Indians were just in the way and wouldn’t admit “our” superiority. Maybe the Tulsa, St Louis and Memphis race riots were caused by “uppity” Blacks. Perhaps those Pequot Indians deserved to die because they wouldn’t convert to Christianity…and so on ad nauseum. Some states have already tried to “sanitize” texts to elide over these “embarrassing” incidents of white racist violence in our past.

In the case of the previously mentioned e-mail there were links to numerous other “articles” some of which don’t exist (“404, file not found”) and, more frequently, items out of context which were misleading to say the least.

The first Black slaves in America (of what would become the USA) were actually owned by the Spanish in St Augustine, you knew that, right? (Didn’t think so) As far in what is now the USA, Blacks came to Jamestown in two “batches” first. The first group was “dumped” there after being captured by a British warship from a Portuguese vessel, the second were from a Dutch vessel and were briefly much like indentured servants. As Tobacco became king in Virginia (and labor intensive as Cotton and Indigo would also) and England became addicted, for some odd reason indentures gradually lengthened into lifetime servitude.

        The real reason Black Africans became the “slaves of choice” in later years was medical, but most don't know or want to understand that. The first systematic use of Black African slaves who were destined to be slaves for life was on the Madeira islands where the Portuguese invented plantation agriculture of sugar. The reason Blacks were well suited was their far greater genetic resistance to malaria. In the Caribbean, Spaniards tried enslaving the Indians, but European diseases and malaria proved fatal, since New World native DNA lacks several leukocytic antigens which Africans have. Sadly, the “trade off” for Blacks’ Malaria resistance is far greater incidence of sickle cell anemia. 

        Jump ahead to the British absentee landlords, first on Barbados, and then the rest of the "sugar islands" of the Caribbean. Cultivating sugar (but really malaria) killed almost all of the few white indentured servants who worked for the very first British planters, so Black Africans were used instead. Unlike indentured servants they weren’t freed. The Brits burned through, via work, or killed an unbelievable number of humans in the name of sugar.  As the cost of white labor in England went up, planters, on the advice of Dutch and Sephardic merchants, turned to West Africa for their source of manpower. Black slaves were imported in large numbers from the Gold Coast region in particular, especially from what is today the country of Ghana.  It is estimated that between 1627 to 1807, some 387, 000 Africans were shipped to Barbados alone, against their will, in overcrowded, unsanitary ships, which made the Middle Passage a synonym for barbaric horror. Many of these individuals were re-exported to other slave owning colonies, either in the West Indies or to North America. The high mortality rate among slaves working on the sugar plantations necessitated a constant input of fresh slaves in order to maintain a work force.

All persons were slaves by race and by heredity, as slavery in the late 17^th century was in fact, race based and permanent. The fact that some blacks did eventually become freed, either by owners on their death (As Washington did) or some eventually were able to buy their freedom, does, in no way, make slavery OK. The fact some free blacks owned slaves doesn’t either.  It is supremely sophomoric to cite the bad behavior of a few as proof that it was ok. That’s like “Well Jeffrey Epstein screwed 14-year-olds, so it must be ok?

        And, in summary, had all Americans acted in accordance with the spirit and the letter of the 13^th, 14^th, and 15^th Amendments 150 plus years ago, instead of allowing racial bigotry to poison their hearts and minds, we wouldn’t have to have this conversation.

       

Financial Genius? Not by a Long Shot!

 

The Worst Lie My President Told Me (so far)

        I am simply astounded that Trump issues, or even contemplates, an executive order suspending payroll taxes. Adding to the confusion is that Trump campaign advisers are saying that the president wants to go further and pass a permanent payroll tax cut if he is re-elected. On August 7, speaking at his private golf club at Bedminster, he said, “If I'm victorious on November 3rd, I plan to forgive these taxes and make permanent cuts to the payroll tax."

        The administration has not explained how Social Security would be funded if a tax dedicated to it evaporates. There’s so much wrong with even considering that, that the villagers should rise up and surround the castle of the evil Baron (‘s father).  

        For the uninitiated or those who have been asleep for the past 40 or 50 years and expressed in simplest terms: Payroll taxes are taxes paid on the wages and salaries of employees. These taxes are used to finance social insurance programs, such as Social Security and Medicare. ... The largest of these social insurance taxes are the two federal payroll taxes, which show up as FICA and MEDFICA on your pay stub.

        When Trump ballyhoos cutting payroll taxes, he is catering to those (employers) at the tip top of the food chain who simply redirect part of employees’ salary to the Federal government for the Social Security Trust Fund and Medicare and add a similar amount of their profits. Suspending payroll taxes costs those employers nothing, actually increasing their profit, and, in fact, does put some more money into the employee’s paycheck. Here’s why:  The current tax rate for social security is 6.2% for the employer and 6.2% for the employee, or 12.4% total. The current rate for Medicare is 1.45% for the employer and 1.45% for the employee, or 2.9% total. Combined, the FICA tax rate is 15.3% of the employees’ wages. For the employee this is actually “pre-paying” for healthcare insurance and a retirement pension, and for many, (about 60% of retirees) it is the only way they’ll achieve any significant security in retirement. For the employer it is simply an “annoying expense.”

        Of course, normally the employer “writes off “ (deducts from taxable income) the full amount they (he, it) pays as business expenses, while the employee who does see a paycheck  increase, also adds that income to his taxable income. Understand the “bait and switch” here, “Yeah, we’re not withholding your FICA, but it will be taxed as income now.” Let’s take the worst-case scenario, which would be that all payroll taxes cease except income tax withholding.

        Now the canny employer, if such waivers were made permanent, could (as just an example) reduce salaries by, say, half the former payroll tax rates (15.3% total, remember)) claiming he’s given the employee a 7.6% raise and pocket the other half. Of course, most employers will never be dependent upon either Social Security or Medicare, since their extra profit will feed their Keoghs, Roths or 401k portfolios.

        Meanwhile, the majority of Americans over retirement age (60% by 2018 data) who admit that they “rely on Social Security as a “major source” of their income and Medicare  for healthcare", would be looking at vastly reduced resources and medical options just when  they need them most. Of course, to Trump and his cronies, this is inconsequential as they will still be able to afford high end luxury insurance programs, paid for with the added profits from payroll tax relief.  

        By the numbers:  About 50 percent of federal revenue comes from individual income taxes, 7 percent from corporate income taxes, and another 36 percent from payroll taxes that fund social insurance programs (figure 1). The rest comes from a mix of sources. That works out to 3% of the federal budget per month of eliminated payroll tax!

        What goes unnoticed here is that eliminating or reducing payroll taxes is of absolutely no significance to the unemployed, who need help the most. Meanwhile, with already huge budget deficits adding to burgeoning national debt (which  candidate Trump said he would “eliminate in 8 years”) Three months of waived payroll taxes would have the immediate effect of a 9% drop in already insufficient federal income.

        Down the road however is an even starker picture of what would have to happen to Social Security and Medicare if Trump has his way. I am as sure as it is possible to be that a lot of Trump supporters are of the over 65 set and unaware that the empty suit, reality TV, talking head they idolize simply doesn’t give even half a shit about this. The same candidate who promised naïve supporters that their Social Security and Medicare would remain safe will never have to rely on either program.

        "I am going to save Social Security without any cuts. I know where to get the money from. Nobody else does." (May 21, 2015) (Turns out he doesn’t either!) The ego evident in this and similar statements rank right up with Nixon’s “secret plan” to end the Viet Nam fiasco.  

        “Save Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security without cuts. Have to do it,” “Get rid of the fraud. Get rid of the waste and abuse but save it. People have been paying it for years. And now many of these candidates want to cut it. You save it by making the United States, by making us rich again, by taking back all of the money that’s being lost.” (His failure is epic in that regard, beginning with the disastrous effects of his tariff war.)

        As a sidebar, briefly (I’ll try to be) the Medicare waste/fraud/abuse statement is simply a gratuitous and unverifiable statement designed to appease the deplorables. In truth, Medicare is very efficient by any objective means: According to the Urban Institute's Marilyn Moon, who testified before the Senate Committee on Aging, Medicare expenditures between 1970 and 2000 grew more slowly than those of the private sector. Note that around 2000, we began to see the marked proliferation of Medicare Advantage plans. So, they made everything better huh? Not so much.

        The average Medicare Advantage (MA)  plan payment has been estimated to be 12 to 14 percent over Medicare fee-for service costs each year since 2003, which in 2009 amounted to between $10 billion and $12 billion in additional Medicare program spending, That this overpayment, coupled with the rising enrollment in MA plans, accounted for 0.4 to 3.4 percent of total Medicare expenses. In short, to date the Medicare Advantage program has cost more than traditional Medicare And even worse, tend to be regionally limited where as Medicare is Nationwide. Of course, since MA plans are a valentine to private insurers, and the insurance lobby is second only to the Big Pharma lobby……!

        Medicare Advantage plans as of today are more expensive for the federal government than the traditional public plan. But when you look at how much the private plans say their benefits actually cost -- rather than what they get paid to deliver them -- Medicare Advantage comes out as the less expensive option. What a huge leap? It really means that MA insurers pay providers even less and pocket the difference.…plus! Again we put profit (for some) ahead of efficiency and cost to all taxpayers. Trump is fine with this. After all, he’ll never need either Social Security or Medicare and he sure as Hell doesn’t care if you do or not.

Leap of Illogic 101

 

     This was originally written in response to another ludicrous FaceBook meme intended to denigrate pro teams “taking a knee” in silent protest of inequality of use of force by police.

      It portrays a first responder to the 9/11 Twin Towers tragedy and the text says words to the effect that "The cops rushed in, but where were the Pro athletes?" I couldn’t let it go, so here’s my response.

        Sometimes we see something so illogical that the lunacy passes some of us right by and we don’t think coherently what it might even mean. This is an example.

        Obviously racist in subtext, it implies that professional athletes (of all races, by the way) who protest the overwhelmingly unbalanced incidence of killing of unarmed black people by police are somehow wrong or ill-advised because they didn’t do the “other’ police job of rushing  toward danger and try to save lives, as Trump falsely claimed he did. His claims of “being there” actually refer to 2 days later and his claim of “sending 100 men" (he had none to send) is totally debunked by those who were there, especially the man in charge.

        Where to begin? Start with reality which is that there was a very rapid isolation of the area and even if the whole Mets, Yankees, Nets, Knicks, Jets and Giants teams had been on the spot, (and trained in crisis rescue and response which they were not) they would have rapidly been barred from entry, even if they had all had their own protective gear, since all such stuff was being used by real emergency personnel. So, the short answer was that they couldn’t “run into the WTC because they 1) weren’t there and 2) would have been barred from entry if they had been.

        The far sadder takeaway from this meme is that it is meant to imply that anyone who takes a knee in silent protest of  police murders of unarmed Black men and women is somehow a child of a lesser God than the cops, some of whom have been complicit in such killings.

        Sadly, I doubt that those who forward drivel such as this process these things logically. If they could or did they would be faced with the fact that they are subscribing to the idea that simply because one member of a group or one clade of a larger group)  behaves heroically (or dishonorably) , all members of that group are heroes (or vice versa). Sound stupid? That’s because it is.

        Let’s use a reductio ad absurdum to make the point. Senior Chief SEAL team leader, Eddie Gallagher, shot, killed and beheaded a 14-year-old girl, posing with her severed head while he smiled for a photo. His own team members, sickened by his brutality, reported him. Who acted honorably?  Can we conclude either that all SEALs are honorable or that they are all murderers? Of course not.

       Yet there are those who, ignoring reams of evidence to the contrary, have, for years, subscribed to the idea that all police are honorable men, and anyone who protests their demonstrable public murder is (take your pick) unpatriotic, stupid, racist, etc. This has gone on for years and it is only in the age of cell phone video that we now see the unassailable truth, which is that some police, like some SEALS, like their free rein to use violence waaay too much and some abuse that “right” to the point of murder. Sadly, much of this abuse of power is racially biased as well.

        So, in the light of years of such action with little or no improvement what are the afflicted to do?  It seems to me that silent protest during a song which really is played in public sporting events, more out of habit than rational reasoning at present, and which about half of the spectators, regardless of race, talk through or other-wise ignore, is relatively modest. 

         Remember this salient fact. For most of us, the actions of public entities (fire fighters, police, road crews, military, etc.) represent “government” at either its best or worst. When 4 cops publicly murder, or suborn the murder of, a man in handcuffs without interfering, many in the offended minority see that as being government sanctioned, whether or not that is the case.  

        One more time: many heroic first responders ran into harm’s way on 9/11, which civilians, even if they were there and wanted to, were prohibited from doing.  In Louisville, police shot and killed Breonna Taylor, shooting the un-armed medical tech 7 times while executing a no-knock warrant looking for evidence related to a drug house far from her home. This cock-up included an officer accused by his own department of "blindly" firing 10 rounds into Taylor's apartment from an outdoor patio. Are officers in both of the above cases “heroes,” worthy if adulation? The answer is obvious.

         We deserve better. Silent protest of murder seems mild, compared to the actions of those murderer cops who apparently, for folks who make up ludicrous memes like this one, are just “doing their job”, and the victims of their homicidal actions are just collateral damage. Really?

Trump Girl

 

This is a litany posted by a young Caucasian female who styles herself a “Trump Girl,” although, in her defense, I doubt she’s a really a trophy wife or serial gold digger wanna be. I thought since all too frequently it’s impossible to get a rational answer from Trump supporters, this one has at least laid out her “reasons” for being one. I place the word reasons in quotes because the word reason implies rationality, which seems to be missing from the list as she intends it. This might take a while so be patient

 

All of you who would say “I can't believe you would vote for Trump." Well folks listen up! I'm not just voting for him. 

“I'm voting for the first and second Amendment.  I'm voting for the next supreme court justice.  I'm voting for the electoral college, and the Republic we live in.”

Ok, here goes: the first and second amendments are not and never have been under threat. No one has proposed repealing them. Let’s consider Amendment 2 first.

        As a historian, familiar with the writers and writing of the Constitution, specially Hamilton, I say without fear of equivocation that the words “a well-regulated militia…etc.” were specifically included because of dissatisfaction with the state of preparedness of the sole source of armed men for the Revolutionary War. Period. Hamilton expounded at length on the subject which, as Washington’s chief of Staff, he had witnessed first-hand. His concern was that should war reoccur (as it would in 1812) that those who were to fight would be better trained and prepared. To this end the second amendment was written to encourage military preparedness. 

       After the war, the Continental Army was quickly given land certificates and disbanded in a reflection of the republican distrust of standing armies. State militias became the new nation's sole ground army, with the exception of a regiment to guard the Western Frontier and one battery of artillery guarding West Point's arsenal. It wasn’t until 1796 (20 years after the beginning of the Revolution) that the regular Army was created and that existed on paper only, relying on volunteer militia to fight in time of need. That’s why there is a second amendment – because all that ensues follows those “well-regulated militia” words. We have a well-regulated militia – It’s both the US Army and the National Guard. While Madison crafted much of the Bill of Rights, #2 was, principally, Hamilton’s baby.

         Now that we have the meaning and the reason for the verbiage, understand that no one has asserted that guns are to be confiscated or legitimate hunters should be disadvantaged. No one. It is true, however, that even if Trump said the Continental Army “seized the airports” (yes, he did, He said that!)  that no one foresaw high fire 30 round clip automatic weapons either. DDT was banned because it is hazardous to both humans and animals. Republican icon Ronald Reagan supported an assault weapons ban. Donald Trump does not, not because he hunts (he doesn’t; he never has) but because the NRA shovels a veritable shit load of money to Republican candidates. What do the vast bulk of Americans support? Reasonable background checks so someone like a James Holmes (for example) can’t stockpile automatic weapons and ammo, stroll into a movie house, and commence the slaughter.

        More than 75% of NRA members, most of whom are hunters, support rigorous background checks, yet Trump and McConnell; have promised now disgraced NRA Executive VP Wayne LaPierre to stall any such proposals. Meanwhile a 17- year-old stone killer’s mommy drives him, across state lines so he can use his automatic weapon to commit murder. And you think this is what Madison and Hamilton had in mind?

        First Amendment. There is a massive block in the brain of those on the far right where this amendment is concerned. It results from their inability to separate the Constitution from the reactions of others to hate speech. No one has ever been sued in Federal court over free speech for the specific use of hate speech. The standard has been sort of the “Yelling Fire in a crowded theater” response.

        Sadly, people like the young woman in question have been conditioned by persons with other agendas to believe that a corporate or business response to an individual’s use of speech generally considered offensive either in and of itself or in a specific context, somehow abridges the individual’s right to free speech. It does not. It is simply business: You work for me.  You use disrespectful speech which offends potential customers. I fire you. First amendment has nothing to do with it; I fired you because you’re an insensitive and offensive asshole whose decision to use the offensive language led to my decision to fire you. Period. You have the right to say whatever evil epithets you care to, but I have the right to fire you if, as my employee, you choose to do it in my business. It simply isn’t a legal issue; it’s a judgement issue and you have none.

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

        The closest thing we have ever seen with regard to government abridgement of free speech is restrictions during war time. That is, up until Donald Trump actually proposed censuring Face Book, and banning Tik Tok because they allowed free speech and much of it was detrimental to him. Pointing out the truth when the president lies (and boy, does he lie!) is a basic right. It is what separates us from China and Russia, but, to this president, criticism of his falsehoods is a violation of his free-speech rights. This position reverses the purpose of the First Amendment, turning an individual right of freedom of expression into the right of the state to silence its critics.  So, a vote for free speech would not be consistent with a vote for Trump.

        As for the next Supreme Court Judge:  Be careful what you wish for. It’s hard to believe any female would be anxious to vote for a President who might try to appoint another Brett  Kavanaugh. Rather more probable is that, like Chief Justice John Roberts, the honor might make the selectee realize just how much more important the job is than politics. Roberts, a supposed conservative, has often voted his conscience (a concept with which several members of Trump’s own family allege he, himself, is unfamiliar.) This has led to Chief Justice Roberts  being the swing vote in several decisions which have gone against standard conservative dogma. Actually, if the next USSC justice is a person of true character and not a partisan apparatchik (def: “a blindly devoted official, follower, or member of an organization such as a political party) then the Republic will be OK.

        As for the Electoral College, you can vote all you want, and however you wish, but here’s a flash; it just doesn’t matter. The biggest issue with the Electoral College is that about 90% of Americans don’t have a real understanding of why it exists or how it functions. I do, but I don’t propose to do a monograph on the subject. But believe me, your individual vote for the Presidential candidate of your choice is irrelevant to its existence. It is odd that Trump hated it right up until he was elected President because of it, in 2016, huh?

 

I'm voting for the Police, and law and order.  I'm voting for the military, and the veterans who fought for and died for this Country. 

        I am too, I’d just like it (policing) done better and more even handedly. My source on why policing needs to be done better isn’t some Facebook drivel, much of which is reprehensible and goes something like this: “Well, the Black guy probably did something he deserved to die for.”  Sadly, a larger percentage of the general population (racists) feels that way more than in most police departments. 

    My heroine, Val Demings, Congresswoman and former Orlando Chief of Police, has stated it about as well as anyone  “My fellow brothers and sisters in blue, what the hell are you doing?” (she demanded in a Washington Post op-ed in late May, four days after George Floyd’s death.)  While she has been criticized for generally siding with officers in many instances, she has also spoken out on the issue I believe to be most important and most overlooked by Republican zealots. I’ll try to paraphrase and sum this up succinctly.

          Far too many on the Right simply believe that anything police do is appropriate. The example I’m going to use is a parallel, but relevant. Generally, if a cop is involved in an alleged brutality incident, three facts are salient:

 1) The officer is almost certainly a union member whose dues pay for immediate representation from an individual whose job is to “get the officer off” vice censured.

2) the internal investigation will be handled by fellow members of the force and probably of the union.

 3) And most significantly, the doctrine of “implied immunity” based upon decades of court decisions automatically favoring cops who kill or injure as within  their rights and duty, There are stunning examples of even the USSC refusing to hear a lower court case of this nature, and race is a significant role in many of them. 

        Now consider another excessive force example, Senior Chief Eddie Gallagher, a Navy SEAL. Like most police he had the training and the right to use lethal force as necessary. Unfortunately, like some police officers he liked using it. I have a friend, a sheriff’s deputy who uses the term “Badge Heavy” to describe these people. Sadly, almost every force has them, and their peers know who they are. Once hired, they are difficult to get rid of. They exist, and many take up the profession because they are either bullies or, worse in some cases, have been bullied.  Eddie Gallagher was a SEAL and the leader of a SEAL team. He also murdered a 14-year-old girl and posed with her severed head as he smiled for the camera.

        Unlike with the “Blue Wall” of the police, members of the SEAL team, so shaken and devastated by what they had witnessed, reported this action to the chain of command. Rather than cover up or simply reprimand, the Navy legal system charged Senior Chief Gallagher with criminal activity, court martialed him, and finding him guilty only of posing with the severed head, sentenced him to confinement and demotion.

        Four members of his team testified against him and were, in later interviews, devastated by the light punishment for what amounted to murder. The primary reason was that it was not clear if the girl had been part of a hostile group or an innocent bystander and the military jury could not reach unanimity on the murder charge.

     Eddie Gallagher, a disgrace to the uniform and the Navy was later pardoned by Trump, another disgrace. When any organization places persons with an emotional flaw such as the propensity to use violence in positions where they believe they can do so with impunity, we enable the Eddie Gallaghers and the four cops who let George Floyd die while one knelt on his neck.

        Chief Demings has been outspoken in her belief that we need to make it harder to get the job and do more screening of psychological factors of applicants. I would also offer that impartial civilian review boards with teeth might help. As a 26-year Navy Submarine Master Chief Petty Officer, I am embarrassed by the Eddie Gallaghers and those who enable and pardon their ilk.

        As far as the military, I know galaxies more than you on the subject and trust me, the military is fine. Veterans on the other hand, (you know, “losers,” or “failures” like John McCain who made the "error" of being shot down over Vietnam and incarcerated only to be further insulted by Trump for it) owe Trump nothing. This is a man who likened avoiding venereal disease to a veteran’s service in Viet Nam. Yes, he did. Even Fox news verified the claims of Trump’s derogatory remarks with regard to veterans. So, sweet cheeks, a vote for Trump isn’t a vote for vets. No, just no. As for dead veterans, Trump couldn’t be bothered to go to Normandy to honor those buried there. He also had to ask an aide who the opposing sides were! (College grad, doesn’t know who fought in WWII?)

 

I'm voting for the Flag that is always missing from the Democratic background. 

First of all, the “always missing” is, simply put, a lie. This stems not from Trump Girl’s personal observation, but from a fake Facebook meme. Blindly reposting Facebook memes brings to mind another meme featuring an attributed quote from Yoda: “If stupid you are, speak you should not” All Democratic functions one could have possibly seen in recent months featured either flags or graphic designs featuring the stars and stripes/and/or red, white, and blue. Secondarily, as an actual veteran, I never served the flag, I served the nation.

        The flag is a symbol, which in many cases seems to be embraced by those uber patriots who love the image far more than what it actually stands for – Brotherhood of man and equal treatment under law for all her citizens. 

       When confronted with flag waving racists (isn’t it odd how those two things seem to go together?)  I am reminded of a famous, but sometimes misused, quote by Dr. Samuel Johnson: "Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel." This comment was not, as some believe, about true love of country or patriotism in general, but the false use of the term "patriotism" by William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham and his supporters. The same could well be said of the current President, who says he loves America, but admires Vladimir Putin while denigrating his own military and its veterans. Or perhaps of the KKK who featured both the Stars and Stripes and their muscular “Christianity” at lynchings.

I'm voting for the right to speak my opinion and not be censored. 

Save your energy, Trump girl. You have that right. It isn’t threatened, but, as I pointed out earlier, others have the right to dislike it and react negatively to it. You confuse a right with the reactions of others to your use of that right in a hurtful or disrespectful manner. Also, as I pointed out above, the only political figure of whom I am aware who has threatened free speech is Donald Trump. Criticism of hate speech is simply anther exercise of free speech.

I’m voting for secure borders. 

This is a difficult question to evaluate. Since your statements are nothing if not simplistic and single layered here’s a statistic for you. Under Bush 43 and Obama both, far more attempted undocumented entrants were returned across the Mexican border. However, that’s not the whole story. Trump locked up children, many forcefully separated from their parents. He did so, citing a false claim, echoed by VP Pence, that ““Ninety percent of the people never show up for their hearing in the months ahead. ... The overwhelming majority, plus-90 percent, don’t show up.”  Syracuse University ran their own program, called TRAC, using information obtained under the freedom of information act. Contrary to the Pence lie, they found: Of 46,743 families, 85.5 percent attended their initial hearing and 81 percent attended all their hearings, according to TRAC. “Most have had only one scheduled hearing,” Long said. For those families with legal representation, the attendance rate was 99.9 percent at the first hearing and 99 percent for all hearings, the TRAC report says. This borders on being the inverse of Pence’s claim. All this without locking children up. Strange, huh?

I’m voting for the right to praise my God without fear. 

        Wow, I have no idea what God you praise, or where you do it, but it certainly isn’t in the USA. Actually, unless you’re a Muslim, Jew, or Hindu, I would find it impossible to believe that anyone at any time has interfered with your right to worship or tried to. Oh, wait that wasn’t really what you meant, now was it? “Fess up. You really meant that you want to not only worship as you see fit, you want to be able to dictate public policy and institutional observances based on your faith. Additionally, you want to be able to project those tenets into education and medicine applicable to all citizens, even though that 1^st Amendment you’re “voting for” bars “establishment of religion.”

        Better yet, the 14^th extends that protection “from” religion to the states: “ No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” This means that I am Constitutionally protected from being legally coerced, forced or prodded into having to follow your specific religious beliefs, just as you are free from mine.

        If there is any violation of the spirit or intent of the document in the area of religious freedom, it is the specious assertion that, as a public officer or business, you are entitled to refuse or abridge service  to non-coreligionists on the basis that doing so indicates your approval of their lifestyle of belief. The belief that, simply as a citizen, one ought to be free to avail themselves of a publicly operated business without a litmus test of values, beliefs, skin color, sexuality or anything else is a basic right. If, for example, you don’t wish to grant a marriage license to a same sex couple, then resign. 

       Of course, Donald Trump, whose own sister claims he has no ethical values, and whose lifestyle has, for years, demonstrated no moral compass, has no issue with pandering to his supporters’ misplaced concept of religious freedom. Don’t kid yourself. He gives not even a single shit about your faith, just your vote.

I’m voting for every unborn soul the Democrats want to murder. 

Let’s start off with the premise that you have a religious point of view which sees abortion as a sin. I will simply say this: this belief, which it is certainly your right to hold, is not Biblical in derivation. Save your energy, I looked it up for you. Of the ten times abortion or murder of the unborn is mentioned in that Book, nine times it is God doing the killing. The other instance is essentially instructions to go to the Priest to get the “herbs” which will induce abortion in the case of rape. Period. Yeah, I know what you’ve been told, but you probably don’t know that it is a recent dogma for Protestants.

         Here’s a history your pastor hasn’t told you. The Southern Baptist Convention adopted a resolution at its 1971 meeting that supported legislation permitting abortion for reasons nearly as expansive as those the Supreme Court eventually would allow in Roe v. Wade and its companion ruling, Doe v. Bolton.

        In another example, a poll conducted by the Baptist Sunday School Board in 1970 found that 70% of SBC pastors supported abortion to protect the mental or physical health of the mother, 64% supported abortion in cases of fetal deformity, and 71% in cases of rape.

    And finally, after Roe V Wade was promulgated: Nine days after the ruling, Baptist Press—a wire service run by the Southern Baptist Convention—ran an article with the lead paragraph stating that the decision: “advanced the cause of religious liberty, human equality and justice.” The story also says the court was a “strict constructionist” court and not a “liberal” court and observed there “is no official Southern Baptist position on abortion.”

        Abortion became an issue, not because of dogma or scriptural justification but because Republican operatives such as Lee Atwater saw the opportunity to use it as a divisive issue and one which many could easily be swayed by few (i.e., pastors with Republican political convictions). Simply put, you and those who are opposed to abortion on the basis of believing such a position to be scripturally dictated have been duped. That is not to say that, as some including, apparently, you believe that not being rabidly anti-abortion is identical with being “Pro-abortion.” I know of no one I have ever met who is pro-abortion. Most in my circle of friends are pro-choice. A truly Constitutional point of view would hold that abortion is a private matter and leave it there.

 

I’m voting for freedom and the American Dream.  I’m voting for good and against evil.  I'm not just voting for one person; I'm voting for the future of my Country!

        I’m afraid you lost me here. Your earlier statements seem to imply that your version of the American Dream is primarily reserved for Caucasian White Christians, but the document you cite was written by immigrants, about half of whom owned other involuntary immigrants as slaves. I find it hard to believe that even you would want the nation run as it was then. If that were true, we wouldn’t have this conversation since you wouldn’t be able to vote.

        The beauty if the US Constitution is that it is general where appropriate and specific where necessary. The first Amendment is specific in what it prohibits. We adhere to the letter of that, even if your President has publicly stated otherwise on numerous occasions. The Second was more conditional, based on a perceived need at the time (no professional military, a situation long since remedied). I guess what I’m driving at is that simply throwing terms around as Constitutional without truly understanding the document and its historicity is a fool’s errand.

       As far as the “Good vs Evil” …..per his own family and former staff, Trump is either supremely evil or supremely stupid or a bit of both, which may be worse. You are young, you are educable, I hope. Rather than listening indiscriminately and believing only that which aligns with your world view, do the work. Read for content and context, consider memes as what they all too frequently are – propaganda.

Cut And Dried

        You’d think I’d realize that reading PolitiFact first thing every day would sour me on politics, but this even-handed fact checking service has no problem with truth, and judges questionable allegations and outright falsehood based on data and reality. In one truly bizarre instance, the clinically batshit nuts Michele Bachmann once stated in a debate that “Even PolitiFact verified it” (referring to a statement she had made). Of course, being who and what she is, she had misunderstood that PolitiFact had awarded her statement a “Pants on Fire” (liar!) rating. Today’s leadoff debunking was headlined as below:     

“It cost taxpayers $120,000 to fly Nancy (Pelosi) to get her hair done.”

        This is typical of the misinformation bullshit which Trump supporters spread in vain attempts to deflect public scrutiny from the almost hourly lies, deceptions and gaffes, not to mention profligate spending, of their leader.

        Begin with the fact that Mrs. Pelosi was already at home and continue with the fact that almost any hairdresser in San Fran will admit that clients come in separately for haircuts at salons all over town. The larger lie here is that, even if Mrs. Pelosi had flown home specifically for a haircut, she flies commercial unlike, of course, Trump, who saddles up ole AF One just for a round of golf.

        Let’s put that in perspective. A flight to Mar A Lago for a Trump golf weekend costs taxpayers $3 million. This includes the fact that the secret service detail books rooms in Trump’s facility for a 2-week block even for a two day stay, at a cost of (to date) another million dollars plus. All the fees are charged by and paid to the Trump organization! This, even though on the campaign trail in 2016, Trump had offered one simple way to underline his separation from his properties: He just wouldn’t visit.

         “I may never see these places again,” Trump said during a rally in August 2016. “Because I’m going to be working for you. I’m not going to have time to go play golf. Believe me.”  Instead, he has played more golf per year than any other President except Woodrow Wilson, who was driven to local courses.

       Meanwhile the real cost, if Mrs. Pelosi had actually flown  home first class just to get her hair done (which was not the case, as she was home on business anyway) and assuming she had a 4 person security detail who also flew first class, (cannot find out the real number, but only two  persons went to the hair dresser with her) would have been just under $10,000 for air fare with a (very) generous $10,000 more for room and board.

        So, to compare, The second person in line for the Presidency would (remember, she didn’t really go just for the haircut) in this most costly case scenario, spend about $20,000 whereas the President, just to play golf, spends $3 million!

        I only did this little exercise to point out the extent of the duplicity and downright lies to which then Right will go to attempt to discredit any person not of the Red persuasion.

        Meanwhile, 18 members of the Trump immediate and extended families are gifted with Secret Service security. This is not only, or even primarily, to cover government trips or trips to and from a Congressional office at home.  In February 2017, Forrest Trump (Eric) and Don Jr. flew to Dubai to open a Trump-branded golf club, which cost the Secret Service more than $200,000. The same month, Eric flew to the Dominican Republic to potentially relaunch a failed Trump-branded resort project, which cost $20,000. Eric Trump has visited Uruguay twice for Trump Organization business, costing taxpayers $97,830 in 2017, and $80,786 in 2019. These trips are totally unrelated to government business and should be (but are not) compensated for by The Trump Organization. What we do know is that the President’s frequent trips to Trump branded properties also put taxpayer money directly into the coffers of the Trump Organization. These trips are lumped under the heading “protected travel.”  A partial accounting of the cost of these “private trips for private profit at public expense” shows that:

        Protective travel spiked massively in 2017 when Trump became president. In the last two fiscal years, the Trump family has taken 3,249 protected trips. In seven years, the Obama family took a total of 933. On a per year basis that amounts to 12 times as much protected travel as the Obamas! The greater disparity is  that, while previous presidents have separated themselves from their assets and placed them in a blind trust, President Trump appointed his two adult sons to manage the international businesses that continue to make hundreds of millions of dollars a year on his behalf. The Trump family’s extremely high number of protected trips can be partially explained by the fact that Eric and Don Jr. have traveled the world promoting Trump-branded businesses throughout the Trump presidency. Ski weekends in Aspen, Colo., and Whistler, British Columbia, by daughter Ivanka exacerbate the expense factor which has far outstripped budgeted allocations. As of the most recent data these overruns have exceeded $200 million for 2017 and 18.

          This explanation of course, ignores concerns related to the extent to which the American people are subsidizing the Trump family business. Despite this greatly increased security spending for private profit, high tab, the Trump Organization has not paid the American people back for the security taxpayers have subsidized when Trump family members travel to support a business that regularly cashes in on the presidency.

        It isn’t only the President who benefits from extensive security staff. While the size of Speaker Pelosi’s detail isn’t readily available, the senior Senator from Utah, Orrin Hatch, said this:

“Twenty-three armed guards protect me and my wife around the clock in and around the Capitol and beyond.” These men and women are like family to me,” the Utah Republican said. “Over the past two and a half years, I’ve built a special bond with each of them.”

        And Republicans whine about a cut and blow dry at home?