Freya

Sound Off! 5/21/21 – R.I.P. GOP

Posted by Freya at 7:02 pm Politics

May 212021

You can stick a fork in the Republican Party – it’s done. Exactly when its ethical decline began is debatable, but Trump’s capture of the party’s heart and soul bankrupted the party morally. Republicans have turned Trump into a golden calf that must be worshipped – or else.

Pillorying Liz Cheney because she dared to refuse to parrot the lie about Trump winning the 2020 election proves the Republicans have zero concern for this country. Only the (no longer) Grand Old Party and its corporate and ultra-wealthy owners are of concern for them. They are hell-bent on defeating every measure that Biden proposes. If Biden signed a resolution condemning Communism, Republicans would all be waving hammers and sickles the next day.

Liz Cheney may be no saint, but anybody who puts honesty and truth over toeing the party line has at least a little integrity. She boldly declared, “Remaining silent and ignoring the lie emboldens the liar.” How true! And she should know. In response, Trump called her a “bitter, horrible human being.” For criticizing Trump, she was booed by other Republicans. And on 12 May the House Republican Conference took only 16 minutes to remove her from her position as the #3 Republican in the House.

What is wrong with Republicans these days? They howl about imaginary voter fraud while doing everything in their power to effect voter suppression through gerrymandering, curtailing mail-in voting, reducing polling places and hours, and forbidding people from giving snacks and water to those in line waiting to vote. They whine about “cancel culture” while they cancel their own. They may very well have passed the point of no return.

Democrats, however, had better not get smug. They need to work quickly in order to get important legislation and programs, such as the Green New Deal, passed while they still control the House and Senate. Rome is burning, so this is no time to fiddle. Time for every Democrat in Washington, as well as in state and municipal governments, to grow a spine.

Even though the Republican Party is effectively dead, Trump’s chumps will do all they can to animate the zombie pachyderm and pretend the GOP is still viable. Millions of knee-jerk right-wingers will continue to churn out brainless Biden-bashing bulls**t and parrot the same old election fraud propaganda. Even if Trump keels over of a heart attack tomorrow, they’ll allow his tiny dead hand to guide them.

What will happen now? Perhaps moderate Republicans, who have somehow managed to keep their heads out of their asses, will flee the party and form a new one; in fact, it looks as though this is happening now. That would be good – the Democrats need some competition, and we cannot have a one-party system. The current GOP has made it clear that they mean to destroy democracy in the United States, and almost certainly elsewhere.

For years I could sense that a storm was coming. Now the storm is here, and it’s building. We must make sure that we get out the Progressive/Liberal/Left-wing vote in the next few elections, because if the Republicans regain control of the House and Senate, as well as the Oval Office, you know what will hit the fan.

SOUND OFF! 5/15/21 In the Pipeline

Posted by Freya at 6:47 am Editorial, Politics

May 152021

The recent cyberattack on the Colonial Pipeline is a wakeup call in more ways than one. Not just about the lack of cybersecurity in our infrastructure, not just about how vulnerable we are to malicious hackers, but also how we really need to wean ourselves off fossil fuels.

As soon as news of the attack got out, demand for gas spiked, as people topped off and hoarded, making the situation worse. (Putting gasoline in plastic bags? Stupid and foolish – as well as illegal. What’s wrong with a Jerry can?) Prices jumped at many stations, sometimes enough to constitute price gouging. People are probably rethinking travel plans, since this affects airplane fuel as well. Public transit looks a little more attractive.

Some people may recall the gas pinch in 2008 after Hurricanes Gustav and Ike damaged refineries on the Gulf Coast. Drivers waited in line for hours; occasionally, fisticuffs broke out. People followed tanker trucks like ducklings. 911 operators got sick of people calling to ask where they could find gas.

The shutdown of the Colonial pipeline and resulting fuel pinch will have wide-reaching consequences. It supplies 45% of the Southeast’s gasoline and aviation fuel, which means that other shortages are looming. Lack of fuel hurts commercial transportation, which means many goods will be in short supply. As the hoary old saw says, if you bought it, a truck brought it. Even locally made goods contain materials transported from somewhere else.

If we got all of our energy from renewable sources, hackers would be less of a concern. Imagine if our homes and businesses were all solar and/or wind powered. Decentralized energy is far less vulnerable to evildoers than a single pipeline supplying a hefty portion of the petrol for a region.

Meanwhile, we need to improve the cybersecurity of our infrastructure. Ransomware attacks are particularly nasty because nearly always the victim has the choice of ponying up or losing vital data and computer systems. Colonial Pipeline has, reportedly, paid the ransom to the DarkSide crime ring, which will just encourage other cybercriminals to make similar attacks. Also, countries that harbor cyberterrorists and do not crack down on these villains need to be held accountable.

In the short run, we need to shore up our infrastructure against assaults such as the one loosed on Colonial Pipeline. In the long run, we need to kiss oil and other limited, unrenewable energy sources good-bye. President Biden’s Green New Deal will set us on that path.

SOUND OFF!

Posted by Freya at 8:01 am Politics

May 082021

Recently Mike Pezzullo, a senior Australian security official, expressed concerns that the drums of war are beating in the Asian Pacific. China and the United States have been rattling their sabres a lot lately. China threatens Taiwan, while the USA tries to protect its interests and its allies. Some say there is no need to be alarmed, while others say there is good reason to duck and cover.

What if the USA and China duked it out? A war would be disastrous for both sides. Even if the US won, we would be devastated economically as well as financially; and with both China and the US in tatters another country could wade in and become Top Dog.

If armed hostilities did break out, we would not be alone. We have numerous allies, many of whom have beefs with China. Japan, South Korea, India and Australia would almost certainly support us, as would Canada, most of Europe, and some Southeast Asian countries. China could not count on much help – Russia may take China’s side, or sit back with some popcorn and watch the show. However, having friends along will not make fighting any easier, and could result in more destruction and carnage.

Asian-Americans, especially those of Chinese extraction, would be in big trouble. The COVID-19 pandemic has caused hate crimes against Asian Americans to spike. If we went toe-to-toe with the Middle Kingdom, hatred for Chinese-Americans would increase drastically. “Made in China” would become an anathema. Nut jobs would target not just Chinese immigrants and people of Chinese descent, but also their businesses. The recent slaying of six Asian women in the Atlanta area reveals just how violent anti-Asian hatred can get. Remember how Japanese-Americans were rounded up and herded into concentration camps during World War II.

War would be bad news all around no matter who won. War is just about as ecologically unfriendly as you can get, even if you deploy tanks and fighter jets that run on sunshine and unicorn farts, and all of your weapons fire biodegradable ordnance. As the old hippie saying goes, war is not healthy for children and other living things. Tens or hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions, would be dead – combatants and civilians alike. Cities and towns would be reduced to ruins. Some animal species may be driven over the brink of extinction. And there is always the looming threat of nuclear war.

Let us hope that cool, rational heads will prevail. Let us hope that both Biden and Xi realize a war between these two powerful countries could have no real winner – victory would be Pyrrhic for either side. We should be cooperating with China to combat the threat that hangs over us all, namely, climate change, which could turn out to be more devastating than any non-nuclear war. The evidence is overwhelming that our planet is getting hotter, and human activity is causing the lion’s share. Just because China has a horrible, oppressive government does not mean we cannot work with Beijing to save the planet. The benefits will be mutual – and for all of humanity.

War is costly. Peace is priceless.

SOUND OFF!

Posted by Freya at 11:52 am Politics

Apr 242021

For several years I worked at a corporation that I will call XYZ Inc. This company has landed many lucrative defense contracts over the years. I took the job because I had hopes of growing with the company, of developing and using many talents and skills, of advancing my career. I could hardly have been more wrong.

At first, work was great. I was fortunate to have pleasant co-workers and a nice supervisor. Since XYZ kept not only gaining new contracts but maintaining the old ones, it looked as though they were growing at an appreciable pace.

Growing, yes. Accommodating employees and compensating for that growth, no.

As you know, large companies have cube farms where people sit and perform their tasks. While I was at XYZ, I was moved twice. My first cubicle was quite roomy, more than adequate for my needs. The second was smaller, but I could still fit. The last cubicle, though, was less than half the size of the first. I could not fit all my materials in it, and as a result had to commandeer a table for holding them.

That is not all. As the company continued to add to its payroll, the top brass looked for ways to cram more people into what space we had. First, they turned the exercise room into another cube farm. I had enjoyed the exercise room because I could get on the treadmill, or lift weights, for 10 or so minutes during my breaks. Without the exercise room, I had to walk outside, or around the building if the weather was nasty. Then they rearranged the cubes time and again in order to make them smaller and smaller. Remember what I said about my space?

Even that was not enough. Soon they started putting two people in a cubicle that was barely big enough for one person. In some cases they removed the divider between cubicles and shoved in a third person where the divider had been. One man was even placed in a space that hardly qualified as a cubicle, even tinier than my final workspace! He had barely enough room for his desk and chair, and one side of the so-called cubicle was open to a fairly busy hallway. One co-worker I spoke with told me that, if he ever had to share his cubicle with someone, he’d polish up his resume in a heartbeat.

This is how XYZ solved the problem of its growing work force. Rather than expand the building, or add a second story, or rent space in another building – there was available space in the business park just a hop, a skip and a jump away – they crammed people in like livestock on a factory farm.

The growing work force led to a shortage in parking as well. Even re-striping the parking lot and adding new spaces in odd places didn’t help. People had to park in front of the recycling dumpster, or along the entrance lanes. Even though I usually got in to work around 7:00 AM, I sometimes had a hard time finding a space. I rarely left to run an errand, or go out for lunch, because of the risk of losing a good space and having to hunt for a new one. Sometimes, several cars would park alongside an entrance/exit lane so you had to be careful going in or coming out. Not only that, this complicated things for delivery vehicles. Now and then the receptionist had to send messages asking for people to move their cars to make way for big trucks, which could not navigate the constricted lanes.

I met and got to know several contractors who worked there. Some of them had worked for as long as six years without being offered a permanent job. One had gotten only one raise in all that time. As contractors, they did not get paid vacation or sick days. They could not get medical insurance through the company, or even through the contracting firm, and had to rely on Obamacare. During the winter, a lot of people came to work wheezing and coughing. Contractors were shut out of some company activities, including getting free flu shots and receiving holiday gift certificates. They stayed on only because jobs of all sorts were hard to find.

Even when work was piling up, XYZ was very reluctant to allow people to take overtime. I got in some overtime on only a couple occasions. Otherwise, you just had to hope that you could keep up with your work, which was always accumulating like mad.

Meanwhile, XYZ landed one lucrative defense contract after another. I did research, and found that these contracts were helping XYZ rake in some huge profits! The distant CEOs (I worked at a satellite facility) were making money hand over fist. Yet XYZ could not spare the cash to provide adequate work space and parking, or turn contractors into permanent employees.

From time to time you hear about people who wig out and go on shooting sprees. Whenever I walked through the parking lot to get some exercise, I spotted no fewer than a half dozen NRA stickers. You can bet your bottom dollar at least some of these people had guns at home, if not all of them. How much longer before someone who had an appreciable arsenal at home snapped? It seems as though this country can go barely a week without a major gun-fueled bloodbath.

I no longer work for XYZ; I have since found a better position with a small company that pays me a decent wage. Since I left my contracting position I have read plenty of horror stories about companies treating their workers like expendable objects, especially in warehouses where people are scolded for being too slow and are forbidden from taking too many bathroom breaks. How big companies maltreat their rank-and-file employees could fill a substantial book.

We may be seeing a turn-around, though. More and more people are clamoring for a living minimum wage and more workers’ rights. Amazon employees in Alabama failed to unionize, but other efforts are underway. Let us hope that we can return our country to one where the Little Guy has a genuine voice in corporate management as well as government.

SOUND OFF!

Posted by Freya at 4:15 pm Politics

Apr 172021

Hypocrisy, thy name is Republican.

Not just the politicians in office, but the hordes of MAGA hat wearers. The last few years have elegantly proved this.

They howl about the expense of universal health care and the Green New Deal, but don’t bat an eye at the trillions we squander on “defense.”

They shame people who receive public assistance, calling them “parasites,” yet see nothing wrong with corporate welfare or giving huge tax breaks to the ultra-wealthy.

They holler for a wall along the US-Mexico border, conveniently forgetting about our thousands of kilometers of coastline. Those seeking to get into the USA would go over that wall, or under it. Since long before Trump proposed his boondoggle of a wall, people have been digging tunnels under the US-Mexican border. If you still think that walls work, talk to the Germans and the Chinese. Their walls didn’t work, either.

They refuse to raise the minimum wage even a quarter an hour, let alone to a living level, even though it has been stagnant for more than a decade while the price of almost everything has steadily risen. They answer demand to raise the minimum wage with propaganda about $20 tacos and robotized fast-food joints – conveniently ignoring (or forgetting about) Australia, where the minimum wage increases every year automatically, and places here in the U.S. that have increased the minimum wage without suffering.

They fiercely defend embryos and fetuses, yet refuse to improve the lot of children who have already been born. They bellow “Abortion kills children!” but are strangely silent about war, gun violence, hunger, and lack of affordable health care, all of which kill children. And fetuses. Also – where are they for mothers-to-be who lack access to affordable prenatal care?

They think that outlawing abortion will stop it altogether. In fact, to hear some of them face-fart, abortion started with Roe v Wade, and will end when it is banned. Yet they think that gun control won’t keep guns out of the wrong hands.

Many of them refuse to wear masks or socially distance in the midst of a global pandemic, mocking those who follow common-sense rules as “sheeple” even while they brainlessly follow ignorant, incompetent leaders. They refuse to “take one for the team” and spew male bovine feces about masks being harmful. Then they wonder why more than 550,000 US residents have died, while many other countries have a much lower per capita infection and death rate.

They thump their chests about being “rugged individuals,” but become sheep every Sunday, flocking to church to swallow camels after straining at gnats the other six days of the week. They think that the United States was founded as a Christian nation, even though neither the Declaration of Independence nor the Constitution mentions Christ or Christianity.

They shriek about the “evils” of socialism – which they frequently confound with Communism – while benefiting from many of those “evils.” Take away everything that could be regarded as socialist, and those bugnuts wouldn’t survive a week.

They break their own rules for Supreme Court appointees. They stymied Obama’s efforts to replace the late Antonin Scalia with Merrick Garland by making a rule that the President could not nominate a new justice during an election cycle. Then they rammed through Amy Coney Barrett right in the middle of an election year – and against the final wishes of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

They believe that “trickle-down economics” works even though history has clearly shown that nothing trickles down. If giving tax breaks to big corporations really did create jobs, the unemployment rate would be at rock bottom and we’d be begging immigrants to come here. Most jobs that mega-corporations create are in overseas sweatshops, in countries where workers have scant protection and wages are extremely low.

They stamp the label “tax and spend” on Democrats when they do the same thing. The difference is they spend on subsidies for companies that are already raking in profits hand over fist, and unnecessary foreign deployment of our armed forces. Defense contractors get the gold mine, while veterans in need of mental and physical therapy get the shaft.

When right-wingers harp on the shortcomings of Democrats and the Left, they are pots calling the kettles black – when the pots are a lot blacker. OK, so Democrats are no prize, especially these days. OK, so the Left isn’t right on everything. But that doesn’t mean the Right can get away with demonizing its enemies and spewing out-and-out lies.

Republicans howl about smaller government, but want to regulate our bodies to the hilt – especially our reproductive organs. Especially those of women. Their deregulation has led to numerous power vacuums, which profits-über-alles Big Business quickly filled. All they do is substitute one bureaucracy for another, and furthermore, for one that is concerned with only the Bottom Line.

And they wonder why Biden won in 2020.

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