Jan 232025
 

Yesterday, following a day of undeserved pardons (and commutations), a day which itself followed a few days of richly deserved pardons (and commutations), many not even reflecting any crime, but issued for protective purposes – The Huff Post Fringe had words. Also, this happened. The link is from The Root, but I’m sure others are not getting left out of the purge. Meanwhile, The Root compiled a list of what it describes as the Canteloupe Caligula’s “most worrisome” executive orders.

This is only the second article from the Contrarian, and it has already come a long way. It is a roughly 18 minute video, and it has CC, and it has a transcript for which you have several options, including saving as a PDF (which I did), saving as something else, printing (which should mean either to paper or to your hard drive or a thunb drive), and reloading. I did save it as a PDF, haven’t looked at it yet, but assume it’s more accurate than YouTube – not that that’s hard.) Mechanics aside, the episode is a “how did we get here” story which should frighten (but not, I hope, paralyze) you.

When I read this article from Steve Schmidt in situ, I also looked at one of the comments – the first one (I don’t know whether they change position as time passes, so I’ll add it was by Martin Dillon.) It ended with “Are there no Republicans that want to save this country?” My mental response to that was “Yes, there are, but few, if any, are in office, elected or appointed.” And that makes them difficult to find. Many have re-registerd as Independent or Unaffiliated. Don’t try to look for them in Congress or State legislatures. Look for them in your community. There are at least 3 Special Elections coming up, to replace Congressmen who have been appointed to some other position, and there are non profits who want to save democracy helping to fund Democratic candidates. That’a the place to start. And sooner than later.

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Jan 182025
 

Yesterday, Heather Cox Richardson mentioned, among other things, that after Preident Biden’s speech this week, Google searched for the term “oligarchy” spiked. I guess it’s good that a lot of people are learning – and I guess it’s encouraging that enough people are willing enough to learn to trigger a spike. But I guess I just don’t live in the same world as people who didn’t already know the word. I suppose that in 1962 there wewre plenty of people who didn’t grasp the implications of “military-industrial complex” too. (However, I’ll bet everyone who heard Washington’s farewell understood the term “designing men” – although it’s much harder to actually recognize one until he’s on the way out with your money and possessions in his pocket.)

If Robert Hubbell provides clarity on resisting, Robert Reich provides a pep talk to stress the necessity of resisting. That’s why I’m putting it first today. I for one needed the guidance of Hubbell to help me get out of the emotional swamp Reich built. You may not, but just in case.

Given the holiday, I need to plan ahead some, but I want to get this in before Sunday. Robert Hubbell makes the difference very clear between resisting and disengaging, particularly on social media. I don’t do any social media myself, and the closest thing I do do to social media is Democratic Underground, and I’m kind of afraid to go there since I posted this Thursday and expect a lot of pushback. The way some members there post, you’d think Merrick Garland was Roy Cohn or Roger Stone. and that just isn’t the case.

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May 282024
 

Yesterday was pretty quiet.  Today I will be getting in touch with my plumber, because over the weekend, my mud room developed a pond.  It’s right between my water heater and my washing machine, so I don’t know which is at faultBut whatever it is, it needs to be gone.

I’m not going to embed this, nor count is as an article, because it is not political. What it is about is how, when you post a comment on the internet (especically when it isn’t answered on the site, you have no idea how much it may impact someone. And you may never know. Humility is a good thing, but it’s possible to be too humble about what we do here, and easy to get discouraged. Please don’t get discouraged. (Oh, BTW, hanky alert)

Hanky alert here too. I can actually see why MAGAts would hate people like Steve and Skyler – because they are nearly impossible to live up to, their existence lays bare all the failings of the right.

I’m not ceazy about predictions, especially ones that depend on people I don’t know. But this is amusing. On that jury, I would have fit in well.


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