The intent of this blog is to promote human equality, human progress, human peace and justice, and optimism. To accomplish this, to encourage the discussion of ideas after identifying and discovering problems, and then creating positive solutions for "we the people," in order to provide for the "general welfare" and "domestic tranquility" of America now and its "posterity" into the future. To encourage an emphasis on separation of religion and state for all, no matter if this is for those "of faith" in a Maker / Creator (Deists, God-loving people, Christians, various people of spirituality) and atheists or agnostics.

THREE-PENNY OP-ED: Being Firm and Fair

May 9, 2021

Right now, I am being screwed by the American healthcare system established by the Republicans a number of years ago (under Bush or Shrub) with Medicare. Republicans have this fixation about privatizing the crap out of things. That is what they did to Medicare. The net result is a system which is NOT firm and fair, but is based on supply side economics favoring big insurance and big pharma. research and development went out the window and put in place in ALL aspects of American business was hording of money in the fat cat pockets at the top, dumping pension plans and the money given to those fat cats in the form of increased salaries and bonuses, and America falling behind when it comes to R&D so as to move American business forward. America no longer knows how to “build a better mousetrap,” but to concentrate wealth in the top 1%. This Medicare sabotage and fraud becomes an excuse for Republicans to claim we need to “get rid of Medicare.” No. We don’t FIX it for the good of SUPPLY AND DEMAND capitalist economics. We DESTROY, right? Trumpicans should be called the DESTRUCTION PARTY of the Fat Cats.

Trump ended the ability for common folks like me to get a tax deduction due to being the nice guy and contributing to groups which need the money. Social groups like the ACLU and police benevolent groups, just to name a few. Wounded Warriors Project, too. Trump and his followers, the DESTRUCTION PARTY, wish to destroy such organizations, too, but proclaim otherwise, especially when it comes to the police groups which collect the money.

Trumpican DESTRUCTION PARTY people then proclaim law and order. This is law and order according to the whims and wishes of white superiority people with money who, if they get black people to go along, like Clarence Thomas, they are like those who say, “yes, mass’r, I will do as you say.” Same thing with gay man, Lindsay Graham, as he says, “yes, mass’r, I will do as you say.” When Mike Pence said, “no, mass’r, I won’t do as you say,” the thugs take after him and anyone else who says such. This is not being “firm and fair,” but autocratic dictators like Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, Stalin, Castro, Mao Tse-Tung, Putin, and others who do not like democratic government.

Unlike some of the cops and law enforcement people I have heard speak out against George Floyd and NOT the wrongs of a police officer, I get sickened by this. The NYPD police union is a joke in their response to much of this, as I see them in interviews on the news. Yes, I do understand the dilemma today with police being in fear of the fact that there might be a gun pointed at them. I have to ask, which came first, “the chicken or the egg?” The matter becomes a vicious circle when there are too many cases like that of the police officer in Minneapolis over all of America. The matter is a vicious circle due to the DESTRUCTION PARTY of Trumpicans and their alliance with the NRA. The matter is a vicious circle when it comes to white police officers not knowing how to be humans which can be firm and fair.

Even for teachers, there was a day when it was natural to use corporal punishment. My grandfather, a teacher born at the end of the 19th Century, used corporal punishment because that was the norm of his day. The idea in education is that one cannot learn when taught unless the student is humbled. Physically abusive corporal punishment was the means to humble the student. It has been found that physical abuse is NOT the only way to humble. It has been a tough lesson for many teachers to learn. The grandson of this teacher born in the 19th Century has had to learn it, even when confronted with the old style of teaching which begins with, “those students are against you, so you need to be tough and grab them by the throat and push them against a wall to let them know who is boss.” Paranoia City, for sure. That grandson refused to use that method and wished to get out of that environment very quickly, especially when it was discovered there was a Matt Gaetz type of jackass on the faculty who had sex with under-age GIRLS (not boys). The bastard got away with it in today’s society, while there were so many on that faculty who wished to still invoke the old 19th Century methods of physically abusive corporal punishment. The 19th Century grandson wanted to scream and get out of there, which he eventually did, much to the chagrin of a spouse who thought she was an expert in everything.

I knew two retired law enforcement people who made sense and were rational, but I have to wonder if they were the exception rather than the norm or rather than the rule. One of these people I knew was a retired New York State Trooper who lived in Elmira, attended church with Ernie Davis, the first African-American Heisman Trophy winner in football (Syracuse University), and witnessed the help given to Ernie Davis by many in church, school, and community, including, as he told it to me, Rev. Leonard Peale at a Methodist church there. Peale, the brother to Mary Trump’s description of “charlatan,” Rev. Dr. Norman Vincent Peale. Mary Trump may have not spoken highly of Donald Trump, but she was mistaken about Dr. Peale, as she described the Trump family attending Marble Collegiate Church in New York City. By chance, the grandfather of the 19th Century, described earlier in this passage, was a friend of the Peales, as was a black pastor I have known.

This retired state trooper described for me how Ernie Davis was taught there in Elmira and went on to be one of the greatest football players, at a time when no Southern university would allow black men on their teams. Had Herschel Walker been around at that time, he would have gotten no where. The movie about Ernie Davis demonstrated how this young boy, growing up in a more intensive Jim Crow area in Pennsylvania, just south of the New York – Pennsylvania border, learned to run so as to get away from white bullies. This state trooper confirmed some of what was portrayed in that movie. He was a state trooper with an idea about being “firm and fair” and NOT to look at someone who is black as being someone automatically against him. But, alas, he was retired. What type of people take his place today?

Then, there was the retired NYPD police officer whom I got to know. He had decided his calling was to be a Christian pastor and he pursued this in retirement. He, too, spoke about issues in law enforcement and the importance of being “firm and fair” and for EVERYONE or ALL THE PEOPLE. He served a church with an integrated population, too.

A protege of Dr. Peale who served in a “crystal” church in California, had many televised services which discussed topics of racism. At one service, I recall a person who came to this California pastor with a doll which was a “black” Jesus. This example is probably a bizarre thing for white racist Baptists and others in the TRUMPICAN DESTRUCTION PARTY to even consider. However, the discussion that day centered on one of the early ones to be baptized who was of black skin and had been castrated so that the idiot with his harem could protect his “property,” women, “against having sex with other men.” The story is in a book of the Bible, the library of scriptural books. There are those who believe it is possible that Jesus Christ DID have a darker colored skin than what many white people could imagine. However, I subscribe to the fact that we seek wisdom, not certainty. There is no certainty about the color of Christ’s skin.

The whole attitude I describe, from 19th Century norms, is something of the past as we can look to better days and come to grips with what it means to be part of the overall human species. But those in the TRUMPICAN DESTRUCTION PARTY want us to take a step backwards and will use anyone they can get their fangs into, in order to accomplish their goal, but then spit them out when they have accomplished their goals. I object to this hypocritical autocratic dictatorial way imposed upon us with fear and intimidation, by white supremacists. I am going to speak out against it, no matter what. You can shoot holes in what I say, but this is not a matter for ME to win, but a matter of the human species to win and survive the future. Damnation against those who speak about Armageddon and a “rapture” because they are part of the idiocracy which creates hell on earth in order to justify their vicious attitudes towards others in the human race. They also wish gay people would die in suicide, too, so we can go higher than a “chimney top… where bluebirds fly.” That song is about living on a heaven on earth, not a hell on earth, but there are too many of the idiocratic autocratic dictatorial group who have too much say over us with their love of money and their power. May they be damned so we who wish to live in coexistence with others in the human race can invoke the ideas about being firm and fair.

Firm and fair. Coexist with respect for one another, not condemn and pit one against another. Living in integrity and giving dignity to each person to live life in coexistence with others.

Speaking to those who claim to be Christians. Condemn. If you are a Christian, perhaps you need to consider words from the Bible you thump so rigidly, at John 3:17: “For God sent His Son into the world, not to CONDEMN the world, but to save the world.” OK. The idiocracy believes we can only save the world if we do as a few wealthy white people DICTATE to us, not according to the guidelines given to us by God, particularly in the Gospels. “Love your neighbor as yourself” means you do not go cherry-picking words that validate your hateful opinions of others. It means RESPECT one another. We may not forget, as God does, but we sure are directed NOT to uphold “en eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,” by Jesus Christ in his sermon on the Mount, but to forgive. Repeat. We may not be able to FORGET, as God does, but we can forgive. We can forgive with respect.

Repeat. Firm and fair. Firm and fair. Guidelines, not RULES from the scriptures. Guidelines and the basis for being firm and fair. When I use the “f” word to describe Trump in my writing, the true Christians are not condemnatory of me, but are firm and fair, as they work to TEACH me, as the greatest teacher who ever lived did while walking on this earth. That great teacher never had to use corporal punishment to do so. Humans have been able to take a step forward and away from physically abusive measures by being firm and fair. We don’t want to return to such measures, especially when considering the treatment by white supremacists against those with a different skin color. All lives matter.

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REVIEW: John McWhorter article, “How the N-Word Became Unsayable,” New York Times, May 2, 2021

May 8, 2021

Thanks for the very informative article this past Sunday by John McWhorter. This is a timely issue for humanitarian, not political reasons. Humanity should be more pervasive in our society than the love of money, politics, and big bonuses an salaries paid to fat cat executives, lawyers, and accountants in America today. The term, “fat cats” was coined by the newspaper industry in the late 19th Century and it is very pertinent today.

There are some comments I wish to add. First of all, where is a discussion of Paul Robeson? According to an article in The Palm Beach Post (1 Feb 2004, “Robeson brought Americans face-to-face with race,” now accessed in Newspapers.com) a number of years ago, Robeson was blackballed in America, similarly to Billy Holiday (due to her singing about the Southern lynching and attacks by latent homosexual head of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover), because he performed the song by replacing the word, “N****r” with “Darkies” (later “colored folks.” (See the explanation of this Robeson change in lyrics during the 1930s at a Wikipedia website. Also see the NPR article about Robeson). Sadly, many of the resources from Rutgers (Robeson’s Alma mater) and Princeton, etc., have been removed, so the best thing to do is not use the Internet, but consult books in a library.

As a result of Robeson being blackballed, like Billy Holiday, he received worldwide reaction and performed in Europe and the former Soviet Union. He was then labeled a “communist.” All this because he took a stand against the use of a word. What is interesting about this story is that Aaron Copland, a white Jewish man who supported the establishment of the state of Israel following World War II, was called before the McCarthy asinine Senate red scare committee of the 1950s and released. There are derogatory words used against Jewish people and gay people. Yet, none of those words were considered with regard to Copland. Copland was brought before the “red scare” jackasses of the U.S. Senate, because, at one time, back in the 1920s, he was a “card-carrying communist.” He had abandoned that in his later life, but was still called before jackass McCarthy of Minnesota. In the state of Israel, they were establishing “commune-style” housing called kibbutzes. Both Robeson and Copland were on McCarthy’s list. I am not trying to put down Copland by saying what I am about to say. But why was a white man let go under similar situations, but a black man was not treated well? All that happened to Robeson was an invitation to perform in Moscow where he was very well received, while America rejected one of its own sons.

At the time of the Post article (2004) about Robeson, I spoke with a pianist who told about the wonderful experience she had in accompanying Paul Robeson when he appeared in the Rochester, NY, area. She spoke very highly of Robeson. Renee Fleming, of Churchville, NY (Rochester area) purportedly recalls her mother and black singer, Esther Satterfield who sang with Chuck Mangione when he conducted the symphony in Rochester. Esther Satterfield is also on a Chuck Mangione recording with the Hamilton, Ontario, Canada symphony, titled, “Land of Make Believe.” This song is a statement about a vision for a society which gets along and coexists.

To those shameful un-American white racists who show support for racist and anti-human Trump and lousy jackass Florida Republicans like Rick Scott (Darth Vader without the mask) and Ron DeSantis (DUH-Satan), human sex artist with underage girls, Matt Gaetz, cite that “systemic racism does not exist,” they need to get their heads out of the sand.

In honor of people like Robeson, Satterfield, Billy Holiday, and others (i.e., singer Stevie Wonder and “Love’s in Need of Love Today” and Aretha Franklin’s “R-E-S-P-E-C-T”), I have a bumper sticker with one word: “coexist.” Thanks also to John McWhorter and others, we can get on track for teaching and learning what it means to “coexist” as human beings, ridding this nation of hateful attitudes inspired by jackasses like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and a lousy wealthy immigrant named Rupert Murdock. Perhaps we also need to cleanse the U.S. Senate of the lousy filibuster rules which have been used in the past to push this nation one step backwards to racist attitudes, after this nation takes two steps forward. Don’t defend these damn rules which were once used in a better manner than today, when they are used to defend the racist “South will rise again” with its lousy and traitorous Confederate BATTLE flag and enabled by lousy Americans like Trump and Giuliani.

I speak in defense of humanity, democracy, justice, but not in the name of politics. Shame on you if you state, “don’t talk to me about politics.” Shameful, shameful of you. I am about the defense of democracy in order to destroy a movement towards racist autocracy. That is NOT politics. Shame on you, if you do because you can go to hell. I don’t speak to “win” for myself or because I might be in better financial shape than others or for the non-colored people of America. I speak for America to win and for the success of America into the future. If you are too stupid to recognize this about me, then also shame on you for your idiocracy. Stop taking a step backwards towards Jim Crow and denial of voting by a race of people, and move forward. If you consider me to be mean in saying this, then tough.

Thank you, New York Times. Thank you, John McWhorter.

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Three-penny Op-ed: Let’s Stop the Lack of Ability to Identify Business Opportunities for the Future by Means of Good Investments in Infrastructure

May 3, 2021

Once again, we are forced to listen to the news on a station like channel 12 as they bloviate the stupidity of Republicans who are not able to think about the future with an overall look at what it takes to improve the lives of ALL Americans in the future. They are stupid.

This is similar to not re-building a bridge to an area which is flatland and could help in the development of new housing and improve an economy, while the hilly side of a creek is not good for constructing houses on the hill because of the flooding which comes down the side of the hill. Progress does not happen because the development on the side of the hill is halted, due to the flooding, and no one can expand construction on the other side of a waterway, on flat land, because Republicans oppose building a bridge, saying, “there are not enough people on the other side of the waterway.” Stupidity with no concern for, it’s the future possibilities, stupid. Just as Clinton’s advisors, during the Bush-Clinton campaign of 1992, said, “it’s the economy, stupid.” And by the end of Clinton’s second term, working with the Republican side, gave enough money back to the Middle Class that the economy improved AND the Federal budget was balanced.

Today, we hear of the stupidity, once again, from Republicans about “spending too much for infrastructure.” Once again, we can say, “it’s the economy, stupid,” not the accountants shallowness with a ledger book. Accountants opposed to giving money to the Middle Class in the late 1990s were stupid, too, but it paid off, both economically and with the Federal budget.

Do these Americans who challenge President Biden have any brains about what it takes to make a good future for America? You spend the money in the economy and the money can head back into the government coffers and help balance that budget. What the hell is the problem, here?

Economist Paul Krugman says that, when President Obama first took office, he did not spend enough and the money was pitched at the big banks, not at the people who were having difficulty paying off mortgages or being foreclosed. These problems with mortgages were due to banks giving freely to developers who, along with the flipping of houses and extensive increases in prices at a much higher rate during the early Bush years (125% increase in prices over short term or just a few years, not a long-term investment as it always has been). Then, mortgages were given to so many people who really did not have enough income to pay for the mortgages, the consumer got hung, the developers walked away with their money, and the banks could then confiscate property in the same manner as Rubio’s enemy in Cuba (Castro) did to people there (including Rubio’s family). Paul Krugman’s comments in the early years of the Obama administration and the evidence that money was being given to big business, while there was proof that the SAME money could have been given to homeowners who were stuck in situations which I described when they were given mortgages they should NOT have received. Things worked out with the results of all that and the implementation of the HARP program, but could they not have been better had those large amounts been given to the consumers who were suffering with houses “under water” due to values going below the amount being mortgaged and, ultimately, foreclosures with a Castro-style confiscation of property? One could say these big bands were not communists, but were the centrally planned big fat cats no different than communists trying to form communes? I don’t think so.

Although I applaud President Biden for working to improve the infrastructure of this nation, the cost is rather high. But on the other hand, we should have been improving this infrastructure during the years Republicans were in charge and we did not. Working in the 1980s and 1990s for an electric utility, we knew at that time that there were infrastructure problems identified by the North American Electric Reliability Council in their Generating Availability Data System, we were heading for problems in the future. That infrastructure was not fixed and the results were disaster this past winter when snow and sleet hit Texas and other areas of this nation. I recall working, at the time, with friends of Laura Welch Bush at Texas Utilities in Dallas, TX, on gathering statistics and so forth in the industry.

R&D was murdered in the 1990s and after. Why? Because of the greed and selfishness of individualism, deregulation, and the formation of larger monopolistic business ventures which can be comparable to centrally planned economics of the Soviet Union. All of the important matters were passed over in favor of a few people gaining all kinds of wealth at the expense of employees and the small amounts of stock the employees owned. Today, CEO fat cats make an increase of 1000% or more compared to those of the 1970s, but the employees doing the work have come no where near that accumulation and hording of money by a few egotistical and lazy people in the boardrooms of America. Yet, number crunchers destroy ideas for making things better in America and apparently have so dang much power that we all suffer as a result. Many of us lost our jobs, due to the reduction of R&D. Yet, in capitalist Taiwan, we learn that they spent tons of money on R&D and have developed a corporation so good that Communist China plans to invade Taiwan to take control of it. Sort of like the South never being able to develop industry so it stole the established industry begun in the North of the USA. That is another whole story to tell.

Then, China is working to strategize for the future, while American Trumpicans complain about it and do nothing substantial to challenge it. According to a Sixty Minutes report many years ago, America was investing in the development of alternative energy sources with renewable energy. When America saw it was going to cost too much for long-term investment before there would be a payoff, American investors threw it all away, while the Chinese picked up the pieces by purchasing the businesses started up with initial “incubation” investments. Why did America want to begin developing alternative energy sources? Because we know that the oil and gas stuff from the ground will be depleted one day, so we work to prepare for the day when our next generations of people have to deal with the eventuality of the end of oil from the ground. Republicans get out their damn accounting ledger books and don’t even consider this. What happens? Such businesses came into the hands of the Chinese, in a free “global” economic system. And Trump thought tariffs would tell those Chinese off. Meanwhile, Taiwan is threatened by China which, like Dixie, wishes to steal the successful technology business developed by those on Taiwan. Dixie and others stole IBM from the North and the Binghamton area, too. The stupidity of Americans who follow the fat cats BLINDLY along, like lemmings being led off a cliff.

President Biden has also identified the need for more funds at the local level and to get back (that sounds CONSERVATIVE to me, not liberal) to the days when there was more control over infrastructure at the local level. Today, big corporations have put in place these lousy computers the customer speaks with and no longer allow the consumer to speak with someone at a local level. Cable television was created in upstate New York, as a “better mousetrap” to deal with the hills of this area in attempting to bring television into the home. It was not regulated by the FCC as much as regulated by the local communities. It was once the same thing with telephone and telecommunications, too. With EMT and fire service, too. Even with the production of electricity, there was often local control. These methods are all superseded today by big corporate conglomerate and monopolies. The electric utility where I once worked with the engineers and many energy R&D efforts, is no longer located in a city in Florida. instead, the control now comes from a big corporate conglomerate based out of state. Same in this area of New York. Rather than control from a corporate headquarters in Binghamton, it is now controlled from out of state and one has difficulty speaking with someone local. I can go on and on, even into the “local” newspapers in Binghamton and Ithaca, which have pulled the plug on local offices and one can never get in touch with a local person. This centrally planned economy, run by big fat cats of industry is supposed to be better? Hell. The USA Today Network is comparable to Moscow Pravda. Why do we do this? Selfish individualistic egotism and love of materialism and love of money, that is why.

At one point in my life, I spoke with a young Cuban man who had come to America with his family in the 1980s. He spoke about he disliked both Castro and what was told about Battista. He said he missed the urbanized America where he could no longer go sit by a waterway, as he did in Cuba, and have no big developments around. He disliked the materialism which permeates America so strongly. However, he was grateful for being in this nation and feeling like he was more free to do things without a dictatorship always watching him.

I agree with this young man’s assessment. Materialism and ledger books, with no plans for the future are what too many Republicans wrap themselves in these days. A Republican objects to spending more money than what we spent in World War II. Stupid jerk. First of all, does he think what the cost of purchasing a car was in the 1940s, compared to today? Did he think what it cost to purchase a home in those days, compared to what it costs today? No. Did he compare the living wages of those days to what it cost to purchase many items, particularly food? No.

Take this stupid jerk a step further. How many Americans died in the 1940s, due to war? How many Americans have died in this war with a virus? What are the overall facts and statistics, rather than just blowing away with ledger line accounting only? It is disgusting to many of us who see a bright future for America, if we only have the investments needed to improve the infrastructure of this nation. We need to work together collectively, but Republicans, as they did with FDR who wanted to meet the problem of war head-on while Hitler was bombing Britain. The Republicans of that day BLOCKED FDR from spending the money so as to help Churchill and the Brits. Then the Republicans later make stupid claims that “it was not the New Deal, but war, which got us out of the Great Depression.” BS to that. There is evidence that the New Deal HELPED, but the war was made worse due to the negligence of the Republicans of that era. To make Republicans of those days look good, what is done? Now make the claim that it was war which got us through it financially. But wait a minute? The Republicans did not want us to spend money and gear up, as what Trump COULD have done by fighting a war on a virus by using the Defense Protection Act. According to an owner of a consumer products manufacturing company in the 1940s, such businesses were awaiting the chance to gear up to build munitions for the British and see the economy begin to boom again with such measures and perhaps win the war and put it behind us. The Republicans of that era blocked such efforts and we spent a longer period of time at war with the Nazis, fascists, and Tojo-loving people than what could have been avoided.

Thus, we can conclude that Republicans are pulling these stunts so as to support autocratic and dictatorial government on the level of a Hitler. It takes money to make money. That does not apply solely to the individualistic materialistic fat cats of America, but for the “wealth of a nation” overall and based on “moral sentiment” for humans, as well as justice for all humans in America. This is the land I love and have hopes for achieving such measures in the future. (See Adam Smith and his writing in The Wealth of Nations and Theories of Moral Sentiment; Smith is the brains behind the development of capitalism).

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Three-penny Op-ed: Scum of the Earth

April 29, 2021

To the person on the Broome County line on New York State Route 38B, for shame on you. Shameful scum of the earth. People tell me if I do a similar thing as what this person (or persons) does, I am stooping to a very low level of society.

What am I talking about?

Look along Route 38B and see for yourself. A nice looking house, not a mobile home, with what appears to be vehicles I could never afford and a banner hanging from the front of the house. What is on the banner? Words. “F**k Biden.”

At one time, I was so angry at Trump that I may have written those words about Trump. Here’s the thing. I thank God that I had fellow Christians who told me, saying such things is lowering yourself to the same low level as Trump and his followers. Indirectly, they told me I was a sinner for doing such a thing because it was handing hatred back at a person. That goes against what Jesus Christ demonstrated for human beings.

Perhaps this guy is an atheist, so preaching would be out of order. However, I have to say this. In the Bible book of Romans, there are words such as this: “the one who abstains passes judgment…” and that is wrong. In other words, it was talking about someone who felt that one should abstain in eating something or drinking alcohol or smoking or taking illegal drugs or prostituting oneself or promiscuous sex or abortion…. (etc., etc., etc.). All such people should not pass judgment on those who do NOT abstain. As a Christian, this, too, means a great deal to me when other Christians work to help me understand that it is wrong to say, “f**k Trump” because it goes against the ideas of, “what would Jesus do?” The answer? He prayed to God with, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” He prayed this prayer as the filthy lousy wealthy lawyers and religious leaders of his day were passing judgment on Jesus.

As an educator, I also recognize that those who are not as informed and resort to such bizarre vulgar epitaphs hurled at people. People without the ability to identify TRUE problems, provide solutions besides hatred and gunning down one another, differentiate between evil and good on the basis of TRUE facts and evidence are those for whom need to learn. Educators, without the use of corporal punishment in the classroom, need to humble without humiliation, before LEARNING and WISDOM can take place. Lack of confidence in oneself leads to grasping at something indicating a CERTAINTY in ones life and ignoring an attempt to gain wisdom.

So, I sinned when I used the words, “F**k Trump.” Good and TRUE Christians help us to humble ourselves before GOD and LEARN, thus gain knowledge and wisdom. I got down in the same gutter where Trump lovers are, just to reply to the bad leadership, criminality (the way he treated his employees, tax evasion, and loan payoff evasion, and in general, the bad way he treated other human beings) of Trump and the disgust felt when noticing there were so many people who were unable to differentiate between the bad and the good. I actually am not sure I can see ANYTHING good in Trump and his followers, except egotistical narcissistic bigotry attitudes with selfishness and greed and love of money.

That person appears, on the surface, to have more finances than I have. But do I know this? No, I don’t. It is mere speculation. I just don’t understand those like this person, even as I try to find common ground with such imbeciles, as to why they moan and groan as if they are victims in this life of something which is called a Democrat, never proving WHY they are such “victims,” and never appreciating that the life they have is because of this great democracy we have had over many years which would include both Democrats and Republicans; both liberal and conservative. I hate to say this, but many of these people are dumb, stupid, arrogant, belligerent, snotty Baby Boomers. Maybe this person whom I speak about is not such a person. I would wager that my speculation about this is correct.

At least this person is not living in a mobile home where the Confederate battle flag is flying and the banner just has a middle finger pointing at anyone who walks or drives by the place. Once living in a mobile home myself and a friend teasing me about being “trailer trash,” I now have to laugh at that. But people don’t like me being stereotypical as I recognize that such people with their traitorous Confederate battle flag and a middle finger pointing at ALL Americans are “white trailer trash.” I guess, with this guy living in a nice home, together with the white supremacist I knew in Florida who lives in a very expensive nice home which I could never afford, helps me think that I am also wrong in just hurling out humorous words which a friend of mine shared about ME.

One thing is certain. In my attempts to find common ground with people like this imbecile on 38B, I have NEVER found common ground when it comes to coexistence between human beings, whether it’s the color of the skin, the star of David, Muslims, Hindus, sexual identity, or anything else. I have found some common ground. One such example was once living in a mobile home in Florida. Alas. My neighbors there all had different colors of skin, practiced different religions, and had different sexual identities. I could not say, “white trailer trash,” but I could be identified as simply being “trailer trash.”

I have heard that when there were the protests of the 1960s against the conflict in Vietnam that most of those protests were led by sons and daughters of wealthy Americans. They, too, lacked appreciation for what they had in life which many others did not have. In my mind, that conflict never should have been waged across the Pacific Ocean. But I did not protest it and worked for protecting American public education in various ways. I still work for protection of American public education, whether I am in opposition to Republican Jeb Bush of Florida or Andrew Cuomo of New York. I will always continue to defend public education, public broadcasting, and public health and hospitals (in opposition to a lousy U.S. senator from Florida named Rick Scott).

It takes peace away from my life as I face retribution from the cowards with the money who wish to force their LIBERAL changes to public education. I say liberal because they wish to abandon the CONSERVATIVE idea of public education which has made this nation great and have dreamed up a change – LIBERAL – to privatize it. These idiots fail to realize that, as with all human endeavors, there is human imperfection.

In this sense, we need to be, as Frank Sinatra once said, “having a good time” in fixing the problems here in our great IMPERFECT nation which Frank Sinatra called, “his home” (4th of July 1974, Madison Square Garden). Frank Sinatra became a Republican because he did not like how the Southern Democrats treated his black buddy, Sammy Davis, Jr. The descendants of those Democrats in the South are now Republicans and yield much power in the Republican Party. Too much power.

In contrast, Joe Biden selected the first African-American female to be his running mate. If this guy on 38B has a hatred for Joe Biden, it has to be that Biden abandoned his friendship with KKK member, Byrd, a now-deceased senator from West Virginia. After all, Joe Biden could not run in 2016 because of the death of his son, Bo Biden, who had worked closely with Kamala Harris. President Biden did not win due to fraud. If that is the case, then fraud also helped elect one-party Republican state legislatures (like one-party communist nations) in Georgia, Florida, and other Dixie states. President Biden and the Democrats have made attempts to reach across the aisle to Republicans but have found no compromising. One example is the stimulus package. The Democrats did re-think the idea of an across-the-board minimum wage, but as they worked to reduce the level of money they wanted, so as to obtain compromise, the Republicans refused to budge to compromise one single iota. The Republicans, in this manner, are acting like communists who expect no criticism and if you cannot vote the way they want, then you are too “partisan.” That is a crock from the Republicans. I am a Democrat-Republican who looks for rationality, reasonableness, and sensible American teamwork. I damn the existence of “blue” and “red.” The American flag has “red, white, blue and… yellow fringe” (words from “Don’t Put it Down” lyrics in the rock musical, Hair). America is great under one flag only and consists of stars and stripes, not stars and bars (with an emphasis on the red). Only Joe Biden has said he wants to do this. If anyone listened to him speak at the Democratic Party convention, they would have heard such words. Trump only spoke about his narcissistic egotistical self. Only Joe Biden has talked about helping to be cognizant of needs at the local level. That might be ambiguous, but one never heard Trump say anything like that, unless it means he wanted local states’ rights involving the power and control by white supremacists like the Proud Boys. So many of us at the local level are subjected to centralized power control by big corporations and their supply-side economics. I can repeat many such examples today – right now (i.e., Gannett closing its offices for local newspapers such as the Press & Sun-Bulletin with its “USA Today” network which smacks of Moscow Pravda under the communists. A centrally controlled propaganda machine, as Fox News is the same type of thing.

I can provide numerous other examples of customer service being centrally located in big corporations serving the Binghamton area and screwing the demand side of a capitalist market. I can explain and prove such actions are primarily due to cronies and friends of Trumpicans at the highest levels of these corporations who make this happen.

Meanwhile, we at the local levels can be damned like we are chopped liver. Government is NOT the problem. The ONLY person who has expressed any hope for change in this area is President Joe Biden, not Donald Trump. Shame on you if you have a belief like this and perhaps this is because you listen intently to Propaganda Fox News?

Government was NOT the problem when Republican Teddy Roosevelt, known as the “trust buster” and others helped put in place regulations which put Americans in legal problems should they work to deliberately destroy capitalist competition. Who uses the word, “destroy” today? How many times has Donald Trump used the word, “destroy?” He used it against the Republican Mitt Romney inspired healthcare system called Obamacare, yet wimpy Romney supports Trump and other Republicans in the U.S. Senate. It just happens that IBM founder, Thomas J. Watson, before starting IBM, worked for NCR where his duty was to DESTROY THE COMPETITION, like a bunch of vicious lousy gladiators from the Roman Empire who DESTROYED Christians. Watson and others were brought up on charges against the acts of destruction of competition. The government was regulating the capitalist economic system, opposed to the centrally planned supply side economic system which is similar to the running of central businesses in the communist Kremlin. Yes, Watson went on and established a very successful corporation.

Perhaps Watson at IBM still used what he learned at NCR to destroy competition with IBM? I won’t comment on that, but I do have evidence that IBM did such a thing and that eventually created a slothful corporation. Ultimately, after destroying many businesses and lives, like gladiators in Rome, the company imploded from within itself. Today we have no IBM in the village where it was created because it moved to the white supremacist South and sent its manufacturing facilities overseas. Fighting the destruction of capitalist competition was NOT the government. The problem has been with snotty ruthless business people who get graded as being successful by the wrong assessment: love of money which is evil. Ray Kroc is another one. There are others, too.

I can continue and go on and on with much more to say. But it does nothing to impart knowledge and wisdom to people. I suppose wealthy ones just wish to brush me off as being stupid and having nothing to add to the conversation. That is because they think they are the only smart ones because they have money. To which I say, as we often said in the U.S. Air Force: you proclaim you are experts, but you are drips under pressure. To such people I also say, shame on you bastards.

To the one with the “f**k Biden” sign on 38B, I say: shame on you bastard. You help destroy what is good about America by throwing out the baby with the dirty bathwater. Expectations of perfection, you sicko lousy people. Notice I don’t say, “f**k you.” And I won’t either. Such people are merely scum of the earth and I don’t want to get down into the gutter with such scum.

Seeking peace, but peace cannot be achieved without justice. And I am not referring to justice based on the perspective of hate for fellow human beings and lousy unappreciative attitudes for the lives which we have all attained. I am blessed, even if I don’t have as much as some of the wealthy ones who consider me stupid. However, I stand up to protect the lousy American healthcare system which Trump described as “private” healthcare. I have evidence that it would be better, for me, as a diabetic, in Canada. But I am blocked from doing so. I am mocked and patronized by the stupidos who defend the wealthy and the lousy American healthcare system.

Once again, I seek peace, but cannot attain peace unless justice is achieved. So I am pushed into a contentious mode which caused me to one time say words for which my fellow Christians may have thought of me as a “sinner” because I used the “f**k” word, as did this idiot on 38B. But you see, once a person acknowledges the mistake, then there is forgiveness, according to Jesus Christ. And it is not up to (the book of Romans) humans to render a judgment.

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Three-penny Op-ed: Democracy and Economics (17 Apr. 2021, The Economist)

April 21, 2021

Recently, I wrote about Queen Victoria, based on dramatization of her life. At one point in her early years of ruling during the 19th Century, Queen Victoria addressed protestors who were part of mobs attacking the palace where she lived. The scene depicted incendiary weapon of the time which was hurled through the windows of the palace. Those devices made one think of the “Molotov cocktails,” used in the 20th Century and derived the name from Vyacheslav Molotov. The name comes from a time period in which comes after the reign of Queen Victoria. When used in London during the queen’s reign, it approximates to the time of the residency of Karl Marx in London. Due to the time period, I come under criticism for using the words, Molotov Cocktail when they did not exist. People dwell too much on use of words and not on the fact that the name used in my writing referenced a weapon which was generic and could help understand what was actually used by the protestors.

Wording is so important when it comes to the false ideas passed down to our day from the likes of Karl Marx and Adam Smith of Scotland. Marx falsely claimed capitalism was “the problem” in the same way Reagan claimed “government is the problem.” People, particularly the lovers of Fox News, just grab at what was said and don’t give a damn about those of us who speak out about the false ideas which permeate the “herd” mentality from a Nazi propaganda machine like Fox News and other extreme right-wing news outlets.

Marx was wrong in blaming capitalism as a problem because capitalism was like a “new kid on the block” and barely understandable to others. The aristocracy grabbed at the ideas of Adam Smith with gratitude and simply twisted the ideas of capitalism to suit their ideas of aristocratic supply-side economics which disdains the demand side of the market. What would have happened if Marx had actually identified what the true problem was? What would have happened if the media of the day had revealed Adam Smith’s turnaround AGAINST the ideas of “free markets” because he felt humans did not have a natural human ethics and morality (The Theory of Moral Sentiments), so therefore there needs to be a “referee” with a third-party group regulating supply AND demand for the purposes of checks and balances in economics. (Also see Economics professor, Dr. Jonathan Wight’s book, Saving Adam Smith). After all, Adam Smith was a contemporary of the American Deists and Forefathers who saw a lack of chaos in the universe due to a Creator who worked with checks and balances, so they devised a political system and U.S. Constitution with checks and balances. Interesting to note that too many Americans grasp at Marx’s theory that “religion is the opioid of the masses” rather than what Jesus Christ said which applies to Adam Smith’s ideas about “moral sentiment.” Why? I ask. What if we changed this false notion? Shameful that human beings claim to follow Jesus Christ (as Smith was a Christian theologian, too), but really don’t grasp his notions.

Smith promoted the idea that ultimately, “free markets” end up giving us monopolies, regulation of an economy by autocratic big corporations (“deregulation,” as Reagan proclaimed) to their self-serving interests which destroy competition and small business. This is similar to what happened in Ancient China when the small business Mandarin class was destroyed and China imploded on itself (see Zakaria).

In stating, “business and politics are growing closer in America, with worrying consequences,” there is agreement with what is proposed in the text above. The fact that American business in the late 19th Century created a rich commerce for America makes quite a bit of sense. However, with J.P. Morgan and others in the 20th Century, America began to steer away from such a pathway. Teddy Roosevelt, the “trust buster,” worked to regulate the huge corporations. This continued after World War II, even as corporations became larger. International Business Machines (IBM) was created by Thomas J. Watson. However, he and the other executives at NCR where he originally was employed, worked to destroy competition and the government came down hard on them. In the process, Watson became a benevolent autocratic CEO at IBM and the company flourished. But once benevolent ones depart this life, they are often replaced with barbaric, ruthless, and vicious dictators. It is seen that IBM was later headed by such vicious men and this became the norm in America, as we watched as CEOs increased their salaries and bonuses so astronomically that it has been a 1000% rise since the 1970s. Ayn Rand and others promoted, with Reagan, supply-side economics and deregulation. Teams of lawyers in big corporations and the proliferation of so many lawyers in the American economy (creating jobs for themselves as ambulance-chasing vicious ones who attack one against the other in a destructive and greedy manner) meant corporations could better protect themselves than the small little business person. As with what happened to the Ancient Chinese Mandarin small business class, these people were put out of business. Fast food magnate like ruthless and vicious Ray Kroc hired people to scout areas with small mom and pop diners and place McDonald’s near those areas, for the purpose of destroying the competition, with the same regard as Republicans under Trump destroy and destroy and destroy, beginning with the ACA which has a goal of extending competition in health insurance in order to help lower the prices which are ripoffs and nickel and diming the demand-side of the capitalist market.

Rick Scott in the U.S. Senate is responsible for the Hospital Corporation of America which is a huge corporate conglomerate begun during the Reagan years with the purpose to destroy the “competition” of public health facilities. The loss of such public facilities really hurt the American people during this pandemic. People like Rick Scott, Jeb Bush, Ron DeSantis and Trump Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, had designs on creating big corporation in America which could be called “Education Corporation of America.”

Jeb Bush and other Republicans like him also privatized the prison system of Florida. The net result has been, to make a profit, by putting more people in jails (concentration camps?). Most of those people are black people who then are removed from the voting rolls. In a recent referendum in Florida, the voters of Florida voted to stop that type of treatment of those who served their time in jails by getting them back on the voting rolls. This applied to non-felony criminals or minor criminal activities, particularly possession of marijuana or cocaine, etc. This push to get black people in jails from these minor offenses is reminiscent of what was portrayed which happened to Billie Holiday when latent homosexual, J. Edgar Hoover, headed the FBI. (See the movie, The United States v. Billie Holiday).

It was very eloquently stated in The April 17 Economist article: “we also believe that concentrations of power are dangerous. Business people will always lobby for their own advantage, but the closer they get to the government, the more harm they threaten to both the economy and politics.” However, to frame this issue as “classic liberals” really puts this too much on the political spectrum, when I know many conservatives who support this ideal, too. As Dr. Howard Dean, one-time candidate for president of the USA, said, “we need to frame the issues to make them more acceptable to more people.” Putting in the word, liberal, sad to say in today’s world, gives ammunition to the fat cats of America who follow fascist Trump and push their own agenda with lies and the re-telling of lies. It is bad enough that they have ammunition with guns and the NRA, let alone words used as ammunition.

Speaking of Dr. Dean. He comes from a state which puts restrictions on big box corporate retailers, not allowing them to build in low density areas where they can become more monopolized by destroying the small business competition. Current U.S. Senator, Bernie Sanders, is from the same state and should nix what Rick Scott of Florida says in his fascist white racist business-loving, greedy, selfish way.

George W. Bush may have had SOME good ideas (i.e., use of switch grass as a renewable energy source). But the worst thing he said, as applied to this article in the Economist about the “political CEO,” “what’s good for business is good for America.” I am glad to read this article which does a good job at shooting holes in this asinine statement made by a former president.

The examples of successful challenges to the pandemic were in nations which were democracies which worked together in good alliances with business and health systems to defeat the “war” of the pandemic.

In the late 19th Century, one could have said, “what’s good for government is good for business.” Ronald Reagan, in his stupidity, destroyed that notion and we are being forced to live by such destruction. It needs to change and we need to rid our economic system of the words of individualist, selfish, greedy, lovers of money and materialism. We need to work on the same principles of checks and balances which our Forefathers used in setting up our political system.

There is evidence that Adam Smith recognized the same thing for our economic system, but the autocratic aristocrats in the monarchies of his day proclaimed they had a “divine right to rule” and grabbed and used Smith’s ideas to their own advantage. They twisted Smith’s ideas in order to keep the status quo of the system they controlled, while playing lip service to the Smith ideas about “capitalism.”

The result was that Karl Marx gave capitalism a bum rap rather than acknowledging how the system of supply-side economics was the problem. In essence, Lenin and Stalin set up the same type of centrally planned supply-side economic system in Russia. The Ancient Chinese did the same thing many years ago. These systems of supply-side economics failed. When will people recognize this?

Even General Douglas MacArthur, as Supreme Commander of Japan, following World War II, worked to destroy two things in Japan: (1) the communist party and (2) the aristocratic autocratic supply-side economic system which had existed for many years. This system made the Japanese so ruthless that they refused to abide by the international humane rules for POWs, often murdering American POWs and stuffing the genitalia down the throats of dead men (see Ken Burns documentary about World War II, The War).

If America does not wake up, learn and gain wisdom about these circumstances today, then the negative components is described in this article about the “political CEO” might happen.

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The Fraud of Private Healthcare and Other Supply-side Criminals

Would you purchase a big ticket item such as a kitchen appliance or an automobile and put up with the fact that it does not perform properly? In other words, a refrigerator which does not cool properly? Likely, you would be upset and demand something better, right? Or you would just put up with the lack of performance of the product purchased? Would you?

This is called supply AND demand economics. Since Reagan and his lousy despicable statement that “government is the problem,” we have moved to deregulation by government and firm control by the supply side in the economy as we have created these big corporate conglomerates on the supply side. These corporate conglomerates have put small businesses out while CEOs of the big corporate conglomerates have seen salaries rise by 1000% since the 1970s, squelched retirement possibilities (pensions, etc.) for the Middle Class, and literally helped destroy the living wage as prices of housing and other commodities have risen astronomically.

In Jeb Bush’s Florida, the price of a home rose some 125% from 2001 to 2006 and the time of the Great Recession. Short-term greed is winning over America’s ability to have long-term CAPITALIST investment in housing, as had been the case when the Democrats were in charge. These are historical facts speaking, not my emotions and my own facts. It is not meant to impart MY opinion, but to teach by using historical FACTS. It is being done in the name of “free markets.” To the common folk, I have always said, when it comes to flipping homes, be careful what you wish for.

In Florida, Rick the Prick Scott, who now sits in the U.S. Senate, blamed Gov. Crist for all of that and that recession. The election of Gov. Crist was in 2006, just as the housing market burst and before he was in office. He did not take the office of governor until 2007 as this nation was already on the path to recession. Yet, the stupidity of those, particularly Trumpicans, never saw the facts and just relied on what Rick the Prick and Fox News said.

Here we are in 2021. We elected President Joe Biden. And yes, you dumb scum who proclaim fraud when there was little or no fraud, only many black people getting out to vote. If that is fraud than you people can go f**k yourselves. (Is that fork yourselves?). Consider that if the majority in the Georgia and Florida legislatures are REPUBLICANS, then, they, too, must have been elected by fraud. In Florida, it was due to efforts of Republicans like Jebbie and others to get black folks off the voting roles and something called gerrymandering which placed congressional and legislative districts in the hands of white power leadership from internal Florida while screwing the multi-racial areas on the coasts.

In that 2020 election, Trump talked about “keeping healthcare private.” Keep it private, huh? That is such a success story, don’t you know? Success for white wealthy fat cats. The rest of us are damned. During the years preceding the Great Recession, Republicans were in charge in Washington and privatized Medicare by adding this sicko convoluted idea to protect big pharma – big corporate conglomerates – in SUPPLY-SIDE ECONOMICS. It is sicko as convoluted tiers are created and put brand name drugs on tier three and subjected to the “donut hole” or the “medigap” principle in which senior citizens have to pay huge amounts that only wealthy ones in the DEMAND-SIDE of the market can afford in order to purchase brand name medications. Furthermore, these bastards called Republicans REGULATED the market and did NOT allow insurance companies to offer insurance with a premium which COULD be a lower annual cost for these medications because there is a pooled resource to help pay for them.

First of all, there should be no tier three. There should be no “donut hole.” These are all to benefit the SUPPLY-SIDE called big pharma. It’s a fraud. We listen as they whine and whine and whine about the necessity for this. They can have a little cheese with their hate-ridden “wine.” (“H” in whine represents hate).

In capitalist terms, these senior citizens still pay into Medicare with every Social Security check. These senior citizens have paid into Medicare for some 50 or 60 years, so they have built up a CAPITALIST INVESTMENT. The capitalist investment these days goes into private companies like big pharma and big insurance who whine, whine, and whine that they don’t have enough, should they not have this form of SUPPLY-SIDE ECONOMICS which screws the DEMAND-SIDE and no one is there to protect the DEMAND-SIDE, unless one files for “financial assistance.” That is an insult to us because we have already INVESTED in this market and are being treated like a bunch of hoodlum fat cats who own most of the stock in a company and then pull the reverse Robin Hood method of taking from the lower classes and giving to the 1% of s*** which controls the stock. And Trump thought the economy was doing well. For those of the 1% at the top, the fat cats, sure the economy was doing well for them. The rest of us? HUH! Not that well. Some of us better than others. It is disgusting to note that 70M stupid stupido voters went along with that whining 1% as promoted by freaking lousy Fox News and other media outlets.

Let me return to my opening statements about how one would not purchase an appliance with no expectation it would perform well. In addition to Medicare investments by senior citizens like me, many of us have also invested over the long term in private insurance. Many have not, unless we had an employer who provided such insurance. We took a cut in pay as the employer invested in insurance, in order to make the claim that THEY were the ones investing in it for their greedy selfish means only – to make sure their employees were healthy enough to work for them. If not well enought, then POOF – go on your merry way. In the last years of my employment, I was also asked to contribute into this insurance and denied a decent salary raise considering the cost of living in South Florida. All this was RUN by Republicans and I find them all to be a bunch of lousy jerks who were NOT like the Republican Party to which I once belonged.

So I paid into this privatized health insurance debacle and now I am being told I have to cough up tons of money for “tier three” bull manure of privatized Medicare with its donut hole. One plus to such measures is that I identified the medications which were not working and for which me and my employer paid for all those years and asked to have them dropped. In other words, I had been paying for a healthcare “refrigerator” that did not cool very well.

And how does healthcare respond? Mocking me by dropping a brand name medication and replacing it with another brand name medication that does not work as well as the first one and I pay almost as much. I have a brand name “stove” of medication that is not a good quality and I pay almost as much as the lousy “stove.” Am I putting this matter in proper perspective or am I just to be ignored, as always?

Then one of the brand name meds, Ozempic, spends tons of money on commercials, something that, along with lawyer commercials, never existed when America was a better nation in the past (before Reagan and supply-side economics), telling us that “most can reach an A1C below seven.” MOST? Where is the proof? Where is the evidence? Because I can say that Ozempic helped me lower my A1C, but it has yet to go below seven, in spite of the fact I have been taking Ozempic for just about a dozen years now. I guess I am just that lousy minority of people for whom the med does not work as well, in spite of my avid exercise regimen and following diets to reduce my weight by some 40 pounds during 2020. I consider that to be a fraud, but I guess I am wrong. OK. So my medication “dishwasher” works fairly close to high quality, but not that much.

My father’s small business selling big ticket items like “white” appliances no longer exists in this small rural town. Yet, he made a business capable of sending three kids to college and giving him a mobile home in Florida. He did not horde tons of money, as the jackass fat cats at the top of corporations do. But he survived, sometimes financially better than many who bring home revenue from an employer. He was self-employed. How many opportunities like that exist today, now with big box Lowe’s Home Depot, Best Buy, and others being the primary source of appliances these days? They can sell at a lower “high volume” price tag, but then nickel and dime the demand-side of the market with service and installation costs. My dad did not have to do this.

In fact, I recall getting my wisdom teeth removed (in my 20s) because my father traded the surgery for an installation of a washer and drier in the home of the surgeon who removed my teeth. They were Maytag brands and my bet is they might STILL be in operation today, as I have heard others tell me about. In the days before the reverse Robin Hood thieves increased their salaries (ripoff) by 1000%, America made a quality product in Newton, Iowa.

Where is that Maytag factory today? Bet it is not there and Whirlpool makes washers and driers overseas, puts the Maytag name plate on them and people do not even realize the fraud and the lie perpetrated by 1% of the population which has gained 1000% in salary (I said that already), plugged up the tax credits for research and development, and “look for other tax scandal ways to receive tax credits. These yahoos have privatized” things with the advantage of that 1% regulating their own market, rather than the government which is now controlled by such fascist yahoos and rubber stamps what these fascist wealthy do. We get lousy products in America and, according to Trump, are supposed to be impressed by “private” business. These fascist fat cats have created a style of society like that of a communist government in the former Soviet Union where the Russians are now controlled by a freaking lousy one-time KGB agent of that communist government.

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Jeff Vander Meer Interview, New York Times Book Review (Sun., Apr. 18, 2021)

April 19, 2021

​Dear Editor:
Jeff Vander Meer said, “It’s more important that books be laboratories and experiments and it’s up to readers to be moral.” 

What a nice expression for which so many of us could agree.  Those of us who would support such a statement are most likely to also be moral, too.
It brings to question as to what is moral?  What is morality?  What are moral values?  At this point, this expression is taken from simplicity to a more complex one.  A man named Timothy McVeigh got his plan for a homemade bomb from a book titled, The Turner Chronicles.  This man was executed for the Oklahoma City bombing.  Was he moral when he grabbed at the contents of a book with an intent to murder which ultimately turned into genocide?  As a librarian, this has been a question I have struggled with for some time now.  I am against censorship.  I am against the book burning perpetrated by Hitler in Germany.  I am against the Southern bastards who had burnings of Beatles recordings in the good old Dixie crap.  I am against someone of another religion who asks that I burn my infant baptismal certificate.  Should I have stood firm about my position with regard to the immoral reader named Timothy McVeigh and The Turner Chronicles?  I believe this takes the Vander Meer quote a step further than just a simplistic consideration.  What is the answer?
Stacy Abrams of Georgia recently said that we should stand firm on our values, but compromise on the actions we take to support those values.  These words, values and morality, are too generic, especially in light of a society in which too many are in control who obtain their values from Parker Brothers Monopoly games, the words of an unintelligent atheistic Russian Jew named Ayn Rand with her “virtue of selfishness” (clarify:  I have known many American Jews who are wonderful people and who do NOT follow the principles of Ayn Rand), and from the false ideas of being “free” generated by a pediatrics doctor for the Baby Boom generation named Dr. Benjamin Spock.  Libertarians and other “free thinkers” today believe in “free markets” and go along with supply side economics as if it would be endorsed by Adam Smith, the one who defined capitalism.  Their “values” are that such “free markets” would be better. 

Not only do individualistic selfish snots help boost Rand’s ideas of “virtue of selfishness,” but in actuality, they go AGAINST the moral values of Adam Smith.  Adam Smith’s writings were Wealth of Nations, not “wealth of individualism.”  Another writing by Adam Smith was the Theories of Moral Sentiment.  Adam Smith, a contemporary of the American Founding Fathers (located in Scotland), was also a theologian who based his values on the moral sentiment of Jesus Christ.  Christ who was degraded as being one to seek to be a “king over Israel,” based on the example of King David and Joseph who became a leader in the land of pharaohs in Egypt.  Christ was dealing with a miserable autocratic government in line with the example of a Trump regime and its autocratic ways based on evil values with a love of money, hatred of neighbors, and pitting one American against another. 

May I remind people that Smith’s definitions of capitalism, falsely blamed by lousy and evil Karl Marx, is really supply AND demand.  Supply-side economics is a reprisal of Medieval crappy economics of an autocratic aristocratic lousy society.  Marx missed the point and has plunged the world into real stupidity about values. 

Thus, I have a problem with “it’s up to readers to be moral.”  We live in the days when there are generations which did not experience real difficulty in life, called world war, economic depression, world war once again, and then “cold war.”  Baby Boomers embracing Monopoly, Ayn Rand with “virtue” of selfishness, stupidity of notions from Dr. Spock in training young people, and supply-side economics.  Where are the values of “the reader?” 

My World War II-generation mother often spoke to me about how bad the teaching of young people was, due to Dr. Spock.  I would say, “I don’t get it, Mom.”  She said, “someday you will.”  To Mom in heaven, “I get it now” as the Dr. Spock generation is causing hell on earth and I would rather fix things to relieve this earth of a “hell on earth” and not face the only possibility of going to Heaven RIGHT NOW.  Morality is not of one mind today, as much as it was more likely with the generations which faced a great deal of hardship and had an appreciation in overcoming those hardships with the America in which I was born. 

A writer in the old pre-Gannett newspaper, The Palm Beach Post, once challenged Tom Brokaw and his thoughts that the World War II generation was the “greatest” generation.  This writer, who was part of the World War II generation, proclaimed that it was his PARENTS’ generation, or the World War I generation, which was the “greatest.”    His EVIDENCE was the historical facts that the World War I generation lived their adult lives, from out of high school until they died, with World War I, Prohibition, the Great Depression, World War II, and sometimes into the years of the “cold war.”  He proclaimed that much of the World War II generation were kids during the Great Depression and a large part of World War II, and then served in World War II.  This writer addressed the ideas about morality. 

When Stacy Abrams mentioned compromise on actions, not values, it also brings to mind a speech by Roman Catholic Bobby Kennedy, Jr., when he discussed how legislating morality about abortion does not work as well as regulating abortion.  He used examples of how regulating abortion, contrary to the likes of asses like Rick Santorum  (who is purposrtedly not even liked by his relatives in Italy) or Rick Scott or DUH-Satan (DeSantis) of Florida, in addition to asses like Abbott of Texas and Kemp of Georgia, Johnson of Wisconsin, Gaetz of Flordia, as well as Trump and the Trumpicans.  This later group of folks might proclaim they have “moral values,” but their UNCOMPROMISING actions are to make things illegal and destroy what they find go against their values. 

At the end of the day, Vander Meer’s ideas about the moral reader ignores the ideas about democracy and compromise on ACTIONS while maintaining values.  An autocratic government like that envisioned by Trump and his followers,destructive forces against democracy, negates the domestic peace of America by ignoring the justice necessary for WE THE PEOPLE of all kinds.  Peace with an autocratic leader might be peace, but it lacks justice for so many people. 

Having an ass of a Supreme Court justice, appointed by Trump, Amy Coney Barrett, does not help to improve peace and justice, but destroys justice for many.  Barrett is purportedly affiliated with LGBTQ hate groups, in addition to the hate groups which wish to legislate morality regarding abortions while falsely validating those who use guns to kill people in abortion clinics.  Might as well say she is affiliated with the “Hitler Youth.” 

Barrett’s morality might be good.  Her justification of actions which are absurd and irrational, is unacceptable.  Even with her actions, I refuse to compromise my MORAL VALUES regarding murder and hatred of folks who were BORN gay, made by our CREATOR.  She says it is not right to murder babes in the womb, but it is okay to hate those who are born gay and outside the womb.  People who might be males but have XXY chromosomes or males who are not bathed enough in testosterone while in the womb or born with two genitalia or ….  I can go on and on about how our Creator gave us life, besides the fact that we are ALL created as females, but our genes help us develop in the womb to be what we become.  Amy “Conan the Barbarian” Coney Barrett proves she is affiliated with the same Satan which Jesus Christ faced in his 40 days of life on earth, following his baptism. I don’t want someone imparting justice to America who is like this bitch, the “Barbarian.” 

As Jesus Christ said, while hanging from a cross, “Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do.” 

Go ahead, New York Times, don’t publish what I write here, which is similar feelings to many Americans (perhaps MOST Americans, according to the polls).  Saying morality is up to the reader is a bunch of crap from bleeding heart liberals who ignore what is really happening in America today. 

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Spectrum Streaming Hacking Interference (Apr. 15, 2021)

April 15, 2021

Abut 8:15 AM this morning, while watching Spectrum streaming, somehow the “mute” button was activated. Funny thing because my hands were on a stationary bike and not on the television or either of the two remote control devices.

This is not a poltergeist or apparition. This is a human hacker in cyberspace. Somehow. It could be a neighbor. It could be someone on the Internet with my IP address.

Things like this often happen and all I get from Spectrum is a denial that such things are caused by human beings. That is a lie because even if there were no human beings, there would be a human being behind the technology which is doing the work. Denial is not the answer.

Later in the broadcast I was watching, Morning Joe, a discussion centered on cyber attacks from Russia and China. Is it this or is it something domestic? How do we know? The discussion mentioned such attacks CAN happen in the home living room and on computer or television.

Stop the denial, Spectrum and others. STOP IT and address your DEMAND SIDE of the market which is speaking up. In other words, your consumers. Stop protecting your damn supply side economics and look at the idea called CAPITALISM, which is SUPPOSED to work better than COMMUNIST China or autocratic and former COMMUNIST, headed by a former KGB agent, Russia. And what about Proud Boys or Qanon or Trumpicans, internally? Consider all, damn it and work with government to stop the bull manure coming our way and wiping up our lives.

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Gun Issues Discussion on Morning Joe (4/9/21)

April 9, 2021

I don’t like statements (4/9/21) from those who speak with pessimism and saying, “getting to that middle ground [on gun control] in this political system.”  Perhaps he was correct, but this pessimism should not be happening because it does not give the American confidence in our system at all and that is exactly what Trump and the NRA want.  You are playing into the hands of the devil called Trumpican redneck white bastards.  I say this as an educator and no one wishes to listen.  STOP THE PESSIMISTIC prophesies and talk about SOLUTIONS that we can do in working together, even if that means getting rid of the GODDAMN … I am saying GODDAMN … filibuster in the U.S. Senate and other means (get rid of gerrymandering, get rid of fraud in the form of Republican electioneering in a voting area – as I have observed – and other means).  STOP THE GODDAMN PESSIMISM.  I am serious.

STop the statement, “it will never happen” when we CAN overcome obstacles.  An administrator at the college where I was a professor would say, “you run into obstacles, there are two ways around them  One is to make sure we learn how to jump over them and the other way is to find a way around it.”
—

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Newspaper, Newspaper, Where Art Thou Fair Newspaper (& the Fairness Doctrine)?

April 7, 2021

When I was living and working in Florida, we had hurricanes quite frequently. Homeowners’ insurance, for a tiny little villa less than living space of 1000 square feet was far more expensive than for a 2300 square foot home in upstate New York. You ask, what does that have to do with newspapers? It does not, I suppose. Except that it was a newspaper article where I read about the condo commandos of Florida who were given license by the Republican Party of Florida in a one-party state, to go after a retiree there when the condo association was fraudulent in their actions to run the association. Repeat. They were given “license” to have the upper hand over the demand side of the market or the consumer. Buyer beware, they would say, as if to mock the consumer and the demand side of the market for “not knowing enough so therefore it is the FAULT of the consumer. No lawyers to protect such abuse, either, as I see lawyers like William Mattar and their stupid advertisements which teach America to go after one another and have no love of neighbor, as Jesus Christ and the Judeo-Christian belief system has been about.

Thus, I am taking a whole paragraph of introduction to begin to describe the media in Florida in which, at one time, it worked to uncover such abuses. Not anymore.

A newspaper such as the Orlando Sentinel publishes to an area of Florida which carried Donald Trump, Rick Scott, and DUH-SATAN (DeSantis). The Orlando Sentinel proved that people ARE still interested in reading print copies. When on the campus of the University of Central Florida and carrying a “Knight” student card, one had access to a FREE copy of the Orlando Sentinel. I know. I was once a student at UCF. The boxes with newspapers were like those anyone could once find in order to purchase any newspaper. But one could access these boxes on campus with a “Knight” card. As a student who once delivered newspapers and has always loved reading newspapers, I would rush to a box on campus and rarely got there before they were emptied.

Think about this. A more conservative newspaper and the ONLY voice in Orlando (because there was no “liberal” one) made money from advertising because their FREE newspapers went like hotcakes. In contrast, The Palm Beach Post, a more moderate to liberal newspaper in South Florida (owned by Cox Media), complained and complained and complained about losing money. So bad that they eventually sold the newspaper to a more conservative chain called Gannett. Yet, when this former UCF student returned to Palm Beach County and wrote to recommend they set a similar “free” newspaper availability with a Panther Card and Owls card at Palm Beach State College and Florida Atlantic University, both located in Palm Beach County, the accountants there must have thought this former student was a real dolt. They had blinders on and were operating within a box. They could not understand that advertising dollars could be increased by selling a larger number of papers – the “circulation.” By handing out free newspapers to the younger generation at these colleges, they could (1) sell a larger number and (2) teach the younger generation to like newspapers, including the print copies. Why such Republican money-crunchers have such blinders on is beyond this former Republicans brain, I guess. (Here the number-crunchers with all the money go again – opposition to ways to increase the coffers of our Federal budget – PROVEN by past BIPARTISAN efforts which recognized, if you give money to the Middle Class, it will more likely stimulate the economy AND bring down the Federal deficit – WE STILL FIGHT THIS GODDAMN NOTION WITH BLINDERS ON THE FREAKING LOUSY NUMBER CRUNCHERS WHO MAKE MORE THAN PROFESSORS DO).

My point here? That big corporate CEOs of big corporate monopolies are wrong when they say “young people don’t read newspapers or young people don’t read print copies.” You are freaking wrong, you idiots who only look at a LOVE OF MONEY than you do about how to MAKE money and EARN money. You bastards have a lousy thought with blinders on and there is evidence to the contrary for what you say. No. Perhaps you idiot dolts would rather cling to the lies of a Trump regarding fraud, right?

Another example (EVIDENCE!). A hurricane’s destructive force destroying a portion of the library where I worked. Contrary to the LIES, LIES, LIES of big corporate publishing executives in America…. the ones who perpetrated mergers and acquisitions to bring together all these publishing houses into a monopolized business… (terrible way to write this, don’t you know? I don’t give one damn). These executives with their LOVE OF MONEY. I repeat for those who don’t get it…. I don’t say MONEY…. I say LOVE OF MONEY. There is a big difference. I don’t think like the dolt who inspired the Bolsheviks in Russia who thinks profits are bad so thus earning MONEY is bad. I think like a CAPITALIST who knows what TRUE CAPITALISM of SUPPLY AND DEMAND and EARNING A PROFIT by being the BEST in a competitive market is all about. I know what INVESTMENT and RETURN ON INVESTMENT is about, but supply side freaking asinine ones have no idea what this means. I have written this for some 20 years and now appear angry that I STILL HAVE TO WRITE THIS so people will LEARN HOW TO LEARN —— AND LEARN.

SIDE NOTE: Thank you, the late Ms. Steinkamp and so many others who taught me this when we used the Cornell University library while in high school. Thank you, Professor Mike Eisenberg (today affiliated with the west coast’s University of Washington, as professor and dean emeritus) and the late Professor Jeff Katzer, both professors of mine at Syracuse University School of Information Studies, among others, who taught me this. Some wonderful teachers and professors in my life. LEARN TO LEARN.

Why do I expand upon this capitalism stuff while speaking of newspapers and the media? You might think I am dumping crap out here. You might think “I want a little cheese with my whine.” If that is the case, and it is not, then let me explain. I want CHEESE WITH MY WINE because I remove the “H” which stands for hatred.

Look at Orlando and its support of Trump. Why? Yet, in Palm Beach County, Trump cannot win there. Why? “Blame the damn liberals and Democrats,” Trumpicans say. They are full of bull manure in saying this. All lies. Bull manure by any other name smells just as stinky.

Let’s see. How many times have I heard the blame put on liberal professors, too? We, the ones who teach students with LEARN TO LEARN. That is such a liberal thing, don’t you know? Yet, I have heard graduates where conservative professors predominate and they speak more disgustingly of the professors at such universities than I do with students who have the so-called “liberal” professors. I won’t mention the names of the universities because I am a nice guy who recognizes that even at THOSE universities, there is a combination of “red AND blue.” Understand that one? If you don’t, then LEARN TO LEARN.

When I was a kid, I delivered what some considered to be a more liberal newspaper. Oh, yeah? Then why did this newspaper feature CONSERVATIVE William F. Buckley, Jr., the FOUNDER of the CONSERVATIVE magazine named The National Review? That was before Gannett Newspapers purchased this more “liberal” newspaper and shut down the “competing” voice and “competing” business. They shut down a newspaper better able to handle the “Fairness Doctrine” than I consider was done by Gannett, especially today.

In Palm Beach County, there were also two newspapers. In St. Petersburg, FL, there were also two newspapers. I lived in both those areas. I recall the Evening Independent, in St. Petersburg, promising they would give out free newspapers any day in St. Petersburg when the sun did not shine. They could do that and not lose much circulation money. Not possible in Binghamton, NY. That newspaper in St. Petersburg no longer exists, as well as the competitor across the bay, the Tampa Tribune. No longer. Merged. The newspaper which won out? A Republican-based one in a Republican-majority county. Not so in Palm Beach County where there are more Democrats. Yet, Democrats are blamed, should they have the ONE voice, but no one blames the more conservative (Orlando) or Republican (St. Pete) ones.

This shoots holes in the stupidity of the lies of the Trumpicans who blame all of the bad conditions on liberals and Democrats and wishing to shut down media which is opposed and have a one-comment media from Australian Rupert Murdock. Get the hell out of America, Murdock, because you are one of the major ruining factors of America and its ability to have competitive forces in media and newspapers. Go to hell Rupert Murdock because many of us don’t want you around to disturb what ever peace we have which can bring about human justice. You are a jackass Murdock… or Sean Hannity or Carson Daily or Steve Bannon or … others. You lie when you blame it all on liberals, while we have watched so many liberal newspapers and media destroyed. It’s like saying the election in Georgia was a fraud, unless a Republican won. And believe me, there were plenty of Republicans who won. The entire Georgia legislature and governor and lt. governor are all Republicans. Must be they all one by fraudulent means, right?

When I was on the union negotiating team at a college, we were faced with a desire by a Republican Rick Scott board of trustees – the wealthy ones of the community who likely got on the board by sending Rick Scott tons of campaign money – to destroy faculty tenure. The union, with a wonderful and vivacious woman, stepped up to the plate and said, “ok, here are solutions in which we can help make certain any qualms about tenure are laid to rest. We put on the table a proposal, before these lousy Republicans, in which we proposed an administration working with a peer-reviewing group of faculty in order to determine tenure. We had examples of academic institutions which did it this way and, with peer-review, it was found that peers were tougher on granting tenure than administrators were. In any method of doing it, though, we acknowledged that it was tough to remove the foul stench of politics and favoritism. DOes not matter who determines it. And. That administrators receive an “unwritten” tenure when there was a white racist administrator who condemned our black president. She had tenure, all right. She did not maintain her position, but was moved to an isolated office where she could continue to draw a paycheck and DO NOTHING which was pertinent for the college. A white racist FEMALE administrator. Did I say that? Imagine if a black man serving as an administrator had done something wrong. Would he or she be given an isolated office and continue to draw a paycheck? Nah.

With this negotiation, what was the Republican reply? Similar to the freaking lousy governor and lt. governor of Georgia regarding the pissy laws passed by the Georgia legislature. And then when questioned about how, if there is such fraud in the elections, then how do they have a large number of Republicans running the Georgia legislature? In this case at the college, the faculty was threatened with firing all those who already had tenure, as if to say, our proposal was telling these goddamn Republicans that administrators did not do a good job in approving tenure. I say. Fire the entire Georgia legislature because they must have gotten there, due to fraud, right? Only Democrats do the fraud, right?

You bastards who think like this are on a path to destruction of democracy and propping up a one-party state. You have destroyed the Fairness Doctrine in media, which brought on hate monger Rush Limbaugh and have worked with a strategy to “burn publications” by getting rid of the opposing voices which provide choices in a SUPPLY AND DEMAND SIDE newspaper print copy market. It has been shown this way all around, from Murdock to Gannett to Newsmax to Breitbart to … and what else? What will Jeff Bezos do to the Washington Post? Got a clue? What about other newspapers who provide an alternative voice and thus give us a protection of the FIRST AMENDMENT. Worthless gun slingers of America (NRA) who still believe the barbaric and savage frontier still exists, don’t protect the First Amendment and lie with paranoia and fear that the Second Amendment will be removed from them so they can no longer protect hatred in America. That is the issue, not militias or the other crap promoted by the NRA which pushes people to run for cover and demand gun control These bastards are at fault, with their hatred, for such gun control proposals. Nations like Canada, where there is less racial divide and less hatred, they have more guns per capita than in America. ‘Splain that to me, Lucy?

Oh, yeah. Go ahead. Come up with some kind of twisted fabrication in order to explain. The people of America have had enough of that s**t. We want the fairness of capitalist competition which once existed in the news media, before the bastards of neocons and Nazi loving white supremacy worked their little fingers of manipulation. We the people don’t want to repeal the Second Amendment because we recognize the TRUE intent of it which was not to pit American against American with hateful, bratty, and immature lousy attitudes, as exemplified by the dolts of Proud Boys, Qanon and other idiotic brats who don’t recognize that it was this one-time mixture, due to the Fairness Doctrine, and competitive capitalism of print journalism which gave these bastards the life they have which is far better than in many other nations, such as those in South America where they clamor to come here and escape the Nazi loving bastards from Germany who, following World War II, fled to South America in order to bolster the banana republic ideology of plantations. They escaped execution in the war-time trials in Germany and have influenced this hemisphere too damn much. They need to be STOPPED.

Newspaper, newspaper, where art thou fair newspaper and a competitive world with journalists who seek the truth, not lies, as does Murdock’s lousy media empire (hate-generating Fox) and others. The BIPARTISAN intent of the 1940s-implementation of the Fairness Doctrine in journalism and media was to assure we did NOT have a propaganda s**t like that of Goebbels of Germany who said, “tell a lie enough times and it becomes the truth.” We need to bring back that Fairness Doctrine and challenge the lies of those with tons of money and preclude those of us without money from being able to speak the truth. Who destroyed the Fairness Doctrine? Think. Which political party works to destroy EVERYTHING which might be good? It is not the Democrats who wish to destroy the ACA rather than come up with a plan which might reform it and make it better. Shall I bring up other things? And even when the Democrats SHOULD, for the sake of preserving our democracy, cannot even come forward to abolish and destroy the U.S. Senate filibuster which is used to advocate the status quo some white bastards think are so important regarding a Jim Crow type of society. These white bastards with the NRA make a society on earth which looks like hell on earth, disturbing the peace of civilization and humanity and ending up destroying JUSTICE FOR ALL. Maybe these bastards need to stop their goddamn hypocrisy by reciting words like this. Where are these words found and repeated many times? “…with liberty and justice for all.” You bastards will find some way to flip this idea to your satisfaction. How about if we isolate all such people to an island somewhere so they cannot freak us all over with their idea of “justice only for white wealthy male Americans, not for those of non-white colored skin or… LGBTQ … or even for many females.”

I have had enough of this. I have had enough of trying to get people to speak out in favor of what I say and they seem to be freaking WIMPS who are afraid of some retributions or other crap, so they remain silent. This silence is like “a cancer which grows” in the herd mentality of the Wimps of America .

Newspaper, newspaper, where art thou fair newspaper? A good newspaper or media outlet, which follows the Fairness Doctrine appropriately, by any other name, would smell just as sweet. We cannot have peace unless we strive for justice.

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