A little reminder from days gone by: 

Back in 2018 I wrote this on my facebook wall: 

   " I am relatively certain that it will come out that a fistful of Russian intelligence operators came to the USA in order to facilitate the election of the current occupant of the White House. They acted in collusion with Candidate 1's campaign, and obtained and used data generated by contractors employed by Candidate 1 to push the election in Candidate 1's direction. It will be revealed that Candidate 1 received material aid from these foreign agents, and that Candidate 1 was aware of these machinations and approved of them. Finally, it will be hinted at, if not actually brought out, that Candidate 1 was recruited to be an agent of influence by the Russian government. (Note: this is not based on sources. it is strictly and only my opinion based on my personal perception and synthesis of known events and projected possible outcomes. I am not a psychic, and I do not believe such things exist. I am however, well up in the news, and in the practices of Intelligence agencies, including ours and theirs. "

 

Given  all that has transpired in the ensuing four years, how would you rate my prognostications ? I think I'm doing pretty well, all things considered. But considering the nature of the material missing from two of what are now being called the Mar-a-Lago documents, I would really rather have been wrong. 

 

Next we turn to Jared's money woes: One of the things a skilled intelligence operator will do is look for people with access (not necessarily power, but access.) who are having money troubles. The deeper and more private a financial hole the subject is in the better. This is ever so much better than trolling for gays or sexual deviants because people with money woes are much more common. They may be gamblers, speculators in the stock market (another form of gambling.) or maybe they just live too far above their means. Jared was in a deep financial hole. Now Jared has 2 billion to speculate with courtesy of the Saudis. I think it's a pretty easy set of dots to connect, don't you ?  

O- -- - - - - - - - - o

 A closing remark : On the volume of scandals.  Not long ago Fox News pundit Sean Hannity read off, in an angry voice, all the scandals that plagued the Former Guy's regime. He went on for about two minutes, listing all of them. Apparently it never occurred to Hannity that what he was doing is reading the bill of indictments against his hero. You could dismiss some of the investigations as being all sizzle and no steak, but you still have to admit that where there is smoke there is fire, and the former regime did issue forth a whole lot of smoke. These missing Classified documents may indeed be the flames we have been seeing signs of all along. I can only hope the damage control party can get to it in time. TFG blew a hole in the bottom of the ship of state, and men like Hannity helped him light the fuse. 

My Statement Regarding Our Exit From Afghanistan.

 We, the United States of America, are currently in the progress of leaving Afghanistan after some two decades of being the country's police force and army. 

We initially went in there in 2001 after the origin of the 9/11 terrorist attacks was traced back to Al Qaeda, and the origin of the attackers was traced to Al Qaeda bases in Afghanistan. In this cause we were right to go in. Let that be known. We were attacked, and we responded, as a nation must so respond. 

It is now some twenty years later, and the USA is now removing itself from Afghanistan. As I knew we would do. We've cut and run, as we did before in Vietnam. People whom we promised to stand by have and are as we speak being left to the not-so tender mercies of the Taliban. My Statement : This is a black day for America. But I don't blame Joe Biden. The mechanics that led up to this day were born by "W" Bush, carried on by Barack Obama (who did try to fix things, but it really wasn't going to happen.) and the last knives were driven in by TFG. He set things up so this would happen on Biden's watch. He hosted the Taliban leaders here at Camp David, and basically gave them everything they asked for. The people at the top of the Afghani government were (and are) crooks and liars who own the lion's share of the blame for this. Had they been honest, and dealt fairly with their troops, and seen to it they got paid, supplied and occasional leave to see their families, perhaps then the ASG wouldn't have collapsed under the Taliban attacks. I also want to mention the Taliban, and the situation there in the region. The Taliban were never, ever going to deal honestly with the USA. They are religious zealots with a power addiction who need to be lording it over someone else, and nothing short of a total control of the country was ever going to satisfy them. There is no bargaining with people who believe that it is okay to break their word when that word is given to a nonbeliever or infidel. We should have expected this, and taken steps to protect those whom we need to help leave the country. Now, dozens of them have died, and thousands are in immediate peril of their lives. We are not doing enough to help them. We will wear the blood stains of this for a long time, and we should. My final comment: We MUST never make war unless we are willing to go the full distance, fight to the last, kill the enemy until he surrenders unconditionally or we wipe them off the face of the earth. No safe spaces. No havens. Even if it means pissing off the Russians, Chinese or whoever. IF WE DO NOT HAVE THE STONES FOR IT WE SHOULD NOT BE DOING IT. No half measures. No more wars of containment. No more Police Actions. We're either ALL IN or we STAY HOME.

The Ghost of January 6th 2021

 Some dates to remember: November 3 2020. Election Day. a Red-Letter Day if ever there was. It began early, with voting in person being mostly stronger than anticipated, but with a lot of mail-in ballots. In Arizona, if you are registered to vote and made a request for it, you got a mail-in ballot automatically. You fill your ballot out, marking the candidates and issues you want with a black or blue pen. Felt tips are permitted. It's thick paper and won't bleed through. Live in-person voting carried on all day, but slowly. Around 10 pm  Eastern time, it looked to be very close, at least in the Electoral College. (in the national popular vote, it wasn't even close, with Biden eventually pulling a 7 million vote lead. ) By midnight, Trump started declaring himself the winner in states he clearly hadn't won. By 2 AM it was clear that, if Arizona and Georgia did not go for Trump, that he would not in fact be re-elected.

St Patrick's Day special.

 

Today was St Patrick's Day. A day on which my fellow Americans make up silly names for themselves and put on a green shirt and get blotto. We won't talk about how this country perpetuates negative Irish stereotypes. The Fightin' Irishman, "A couple of stout Irish girls to do the heavy work around the house." and Trooper Thorn Sean Thornton. We have heavier lifting to do. Heavier lifting like "The Kung-Flu" and the fact that Asian-Americans get treated like punching bags and nobody tries to stop it. So go on and poke fun at me and my ancestors, drink beer with green food color in it. Just stop shooting Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. Mmmk ?

The Good Ole Days, more dream than real.

 (Cross posted from my Facebook account) 

Do you long for the Good Old Days ? 

        Feeling Nostalgic for the "good old days" of the 50s and early 60s? Yeah, that's probably because our higher taxes and stronger union protections made it possible for you to get a good paying job right out of high school and be able to support a family on it. But then you tossed all that in the garbage by voting for a string of men who cut taxes on the richest Americans and then told you it was your fault you weren't making enough money. Of course, you got tired of hearing it was your fault for not making enough money, so then they started telling you it was "The Illegals" who were taking your jobs. And the Foreigners. They tried to train you to hate those people, and many of you did. When all the while, it was you who voted for Reagan, GHW Bush, W Bush and now Trump, who sold you down the river. You bought into the conservative mumbo-jumbo , the hate-mongering and fear-mongering, and now you're seeing your progeny get hammered by the tool you thought would make YOUR life better. Well, has it ? Your children, the so-called Millenials, have an average of 37000 in student loan debt -- debt they accrued because successive waves of conservatives have all but wiped out grants, and seen to it that college tuition has skyrocketed. Your children, those self-same Millenials everyone loves to complain about, are stuck in jobs with few benefits and all too often are "full time availability with part time hours" or trick hours where they work 39 hours a week so their employer doesn't have to pay their insurance or retirement benefits. Oh sure, they might get a 401k . . . for company stock, which could collapse at any moment. Further, said millenials have had their retirement age pushed from 62 to 65 to 67 and it'll be 69 or 70 soon. Oh, but their social security will be means-tested so that the conservatives can call it "Welfare" and then cut it. But don't worry, YOUR Medicaid won't be cut. and YOUR SSRI won't be cut. But what about the rest of us ?

It was not Ronald Reagan, GHW Bush or GW Bush, it wasn't the 230-odd republican/Tea-Party/Libertarian-Conservatives in the House of Representatives or the 52 in the Senate who killed The American Dream, it was you who voted for all those men. You bought into their line of bullshit, and now you have to own it. The good news is, you do not have to let things lie. You don't have to stay in the bed you made, you can get up and re-make it. But you won't get there by voting for more of the same. You won't get there by putting more conservatives in office. You will only continue to revoke the generations of social progress that led up to your being able to have the jobs you had, and that your children and grandchildren need.

The Great Divide

 

 The political divide did not happen overnight, was not created by Donald Trump, and will not be made to go away by Joe Biden.

Newt Gingrich created the divide with his late night speeches in the well of the House, where he had a no cost cable TV presence. He spun the fable that there must be no compromises. That it would be his way or no way. Not many people saw him, but the right group of people did. Young, politically active republicans. They took Gingrich's message to heart, and went to war. No holds barred, stop at nothing to gain power. The first power grabs were not in the Federal legislature alone, but in state houses, governorship and other state-level offices. Thus the first of the big lies were told. "I'm against fraud, waste, and abuse! I'm a fiscal conservative! you can trust me with your money." Except they were not simple fiscal conservatives. They were die hard right wing christian conservatives, who wanted power not for what they could do for the people, but for what they could do TO the people. They Gerrymandered as much of the political map as they could. Then again in 2000. and again in 2010. The left were stupidly complacent. They had controlled the Congress off and on but more on than off since the 1970s, and saw no reason why things should change. The Supreme Court was carefully stage-managed. The lower courts were allowed to start to run empty. In fact, during Obama's time they were intentionally kept empty by McConnell. Now there are some 50 or so seats in the House which are, and will be for some time to come, absolutely safe GOP seats, and they are filled with Ideologues who, like Gingrich, insist it be their way or no way. At least the GOP are out of the Majority in the House, for now. But it's another census year, and Despite strenuous efforts by former President Obama, the political landscape won't change much.  Then comes 1987, and Reagan-appointee Dennis R Patrick's decision as FCC Chairman to undo the Fairness Doctrine. The Fairness Doctrine was an FCC rule that demanded that broadcasters, both radio and television, who use a federal license, include in their programming a certain number of hours of coverage of public affairs and of controversial issues, and that said coverage be, in the FCCs view fair, unbiased and represent both sides of an issue. This rule was in place from 1944 until it was removed. But the thing is, the Reagan argument was that rules are unnecessary in a civilized society, where the free market will see to it that the battle of ideas carries to those who wish to watch. The problem with that idea is that people will, if given the choice, avoid ideas that don't flow with our own. We self-select for information that agrees with us. Information no longer is non-partisan. Presentation of news is politically driven. People become so familiar with the news that suits their biases that things that run contrary to them are seen as alien,or other. Those who cleave to other ideas are seen as Alien. Politics goes from being the marketplace of Ideas and becomes the Battleground of Ideas. But then comes someone like Trump, who has no connection to truth. He comes and lies to us, and those whose biases are more ideologically of the same polarity as the Trump lies decide they will believe the lie, even if somewhere in their mind they know it's not true. Trump has become like a cult leader, stringing lies together, getting people hooked on the lie. This is why they chant at Trump rallies. It's a form of group affirmation. They need to know they are not the only one who buys the lie. And so it goes. The political divide has gotten wider to the point it's causing families to disintegrate. It's breaking up friendships and causing fights. Please that it not cause worse violence. I'm not a big fan of Joe Biden, but by damn we need someone to pull us back from the brink.

A short bit about Flat Earthers. (uh well, it got bigger.)

I am and have been a man of science, reason and fact-based life. 

Unlike some, I do not care if you yourself hold religious views. 

                    I used to. I used to rail against religion the way some people rail against smoking cigarettes or eating red meat. I've given up on it, having realized that religion is one of those things you can't argue people out of. So, I don't bother. If you wish to continue believing I can't stop you. But you can still hold religious views, express religious faith and worship in the manner that suits you without eschewing science and reason. While the two are not wholly compatible, they can and do co-exist without friction. Some consider there to be non-overlapping magisteria, that is to say, the two things each have their own provinces which they do well in just so long as they stay within their realm -- keep to their own lane, so to speak. A prime example of what happens when religion attempts to speak to a question of science is when religious zealots attempt to define the fundamental nature of our home planet. For anyone who has studied science it's a settled issue - - the earth is a very slightly oblate spheroid some 12742 km in diameter, that turns on it's N-S Axis once every 24.025 hours, and orbits it's primary star at a distance of some 151.42 million km once every 365.25 days. These facts are not conjecture, or suppositions, they are known. They are observations, made using instruments from the primitive  -- a pole of known length -- to the incredible -- a ring laser gyro, or focused light prism gyroscope. The first attempt to divine the circumference of the earth was done by Eratosthenes in 245 BC; see Wikipedia's explanation of how, here : Wikipedia on Eratosthenes

Why the delay in Impeaching and Removing Trump ? I'll try to explain.

 Donald Trump has, in these last weeks, committed at least two Impeachable offenses, yet he is still in office. Why is this? 

I'll try to explain.

         First, consider the Republicans in the Senate who are Afraid of Trump's "base,"A group of angry white conservatives whom Trump keeps angry by feeding them big lies disguised as slabs of red meat. Many GOP congressmen are afraid of what will happen to their re-election chances if Trump turns against them and directs that someone "primary" them. (being Primaried from the right has been a GOP leadership scare tactic since before McConnell was in the Senate) They do not want to risk losing their cushy jobs. Next, consider the possibility of a Republican caucus in the Senate who believe it's worth keeping Trump so long as they're getting the conservative judges they want. Many Republicans in the Senate are what I call "Movement Conservatives" -- they believe wholeheartedly in the hard right idea of a government which only runs the military and grants cash to corporations. No other functions should exist. Finally, we come to  GOP leadership that includes McConnell, whose state got a promise of a 100 million dollar aluminum factory in Kentucky out of Oleg Deripaska's Rusal. Make no mistakes, the Russians have studied long and hard how to wage next-generation warfare (1) and they are currently winning. Their mission was to knock the USA down, and they're succeeding. They have found a political party in the USA who will stop at nothing to remain in power, and they're using them all they can and more. As I've said elsewhere, Trump is working hard to destroy the US government from within. As I said elsewhere, the Russians first tried this in Ukraine in 2012-14. THe Ukrainians got up on their hind legs and threw out the Putinistas. I'm worried we haven't got the spine for it. The 2020 elections will be the final test. We'll either pass and oust Trump and the Republicans or we'll fail and go down the drain as a Democratic Republic.

Sound the Trump ets, Tell Joshua to bring his horn.

Okay, so I had to do this post sooner or later. This has been bugging me like a pesky fly that won't leave off. Donald "I'm a raving loon" Trump's wall is a waste of money, time and effort. We all know this, don't we ? Don't we ? You do realize that walls are a 4th century solution that are easily breached, overcome, tunneled under, knocked down or simply gone around. Yes, I know, various nations have tried walls : Rome with Hadrian's Wall, China with the Great Wall, France with the Maginot Line, and now Trump with Trump's Folly.

In Case You Missed It :

You thought that hardline conservatives were dead ? You thought "Oh yeah, with the Orange Dufus in office they're so going to lose!" Well, I hope yesterday showed you just how wrong you were. 

So, if you were watching the news or reading the papers yesterday, you saw the big salvo the hard right have been saving up to hit you with just when you thought The Orange Duce' was on the ropes. Turns out you were wrong. He was just a distraction, while the real damage was being done belowdecks, out of your sight. This has been coming for decades, and few people saw it. I've tried to issue some form of warning before in these pages, but even I didn't see the worst of it coming.

Of Anger, and the Useful Idiot.

I cannot state in simple words the level of anger I am living with at the way Trump (and more importantly his handlers) are being permitted to ruin this country. Already our reputation -- never that spectacular to begin with -- has been further sullied. Our economy, which should be running on rails built by men of vision like Obama, is teetering near the edge of a precipice, ready to fall at the first good hard shove. Why do you think Trump is throwing monkey wrenches into the works at every chance ? Because he's been coached to do so. Trump himself isn't smart enough to know a Tariff from a Mastiff. But he's capable of learning his lines, and of saying them. Why else do you think that every time he says something off the cuff, hours later it's walked back by Miller or Sanders or Mnuchin. It's because he's gone off script and has to be corrected. Trump couldn't give two shits about the USA-Mexico border. He cares about those Rosneft dollars he was promised if he's a good boy and doesn't get impeached before the end of his first term. Trump is nothing more than a Useful Idiot. A stooge, in the worst sense of the word. Oh, he used to be a middling-quality grifter, but then he met his betters in the mid-90s. (some say the mid-80s, but I digress). He's happy as pigs in mud to roll along with whatever *they* want just so long as he gets his payoff when it's over. I can only hope that there is a God out there who cares about justice. I'm running out of life-time and I really want to see the country that I love put back on the right course. Where we can go back to being the Shining City on a Hill. Where the Modern Colossus can lift her lamp in pride. Where the jolly red white and blue can be paraded again by people who have good reason to be proud of it. Oh the ignominious ending I can see. Where our nation breaks apart into balkanized states at the direction of China and Russia. Where we, once a great nation of high-minded souls become nothing more than laborers for the people with the most gold. Why aren't there hundreds of thousands in the streets even now?  I know why. because they, like me, lack the means to do so. Or perhaps they, like me, suffer from "Old White Man" diseases, like diabetes and it's backup men peripheral neuropathy, depression, kidney disease and vision loss.  or heart failure. or lungs sick from too many cigarettes. All I can do is look on in anger, like the farmer whose corn is being set upon by 100 crows he cannot run off and cannot kill. I, and my country. The land I was born into, and the nation I was so proud of in 1969 when we walked on the moon. In 1965 when we passed the voting rights act. When we held up ideals of equality under the law for all. what have we become ? I feel despair as well. Like Victor Frankenstien's servants, all I can do is watch in horror as the master's creation runs amok. I did only act as a humble, loyal servant, and now everything is in ruins because I didn't do better. I didn't know better. We're coming to ruin, the ship of state nearly on the rocks, all because some greedy custard-head sold the sails to Levi Strauss, and the Anchors to General Motors. I'm trying to not let it make me bitter.

A special political message.

Excuse the rant, but : 

We've all been nominating this and that for the "Real" national emergency. I'm gonna barge in now and remind everyone what the *Real* For-Reals Actual forget that other stuff for now bolded double-underlined National Emergency is. The one we cannot ignore much longer if we want to have a Democracy any longer. The crisis is much bigger than the doddering old coward and crook occupying the White House without the permission of 2/3 of the country. The Emergency is this : We have allowed ourselves to put our Democracy up for sale to the highest bidder due to the Citizens United decision, and we have sold it out cheap, for a few measly Russian billions paid to a fistful of mendacious, larcenous, rapacious, power hungry damned fools who want to destroy the American Government because they didn't like the outcome of the Civil War. A few stupid, petty men who have neither the heart to help their fellow men nor the soul to hold to the American ideals. A fistful of men too interested in their own petty bullshit political fights to retain any fealty to the ideals expressed in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States. These men (and they are indeed nearly all men, with few women and no persons of color ) want control over all people so that they can deliver the greatest amounts of misery to the poor while shoving money into the pockets of the wealthiest, but even that is of only secondary importance. The greatest emergency by far is the need to take back our FORM of government, wherein money is not speech, wherein secrecy is not permitted, and all must act in the open. No more secret PACs! No More unlimited campaign donations. The purpose of secret money groups is not free speech, but secret bribery. We must demand an immediate move to amend the constitution to ban such uses of money. If not that, then a renewal of McCain-Feingold, constructed so as to withstand supreme court scrutiny. WE HAVE TO GET THE BIG MONEY MEN OUT OF OUR POLITICS ! No one should be able to BUY an election!

Rant Over.

Teal Deer

Teal Deer version : Stop talking about this and that for a moment and realize those are secondary at best. If we allow ourselves to further descend into an Oligarchy none of that stuff will ever get done.

Nixon, Trump and Weasels

I was reaching the end of my boyhood when the whole Nixon thing brewed up.

      I remember well sitting in the kitchen with Mom and eating my breakfast while she got our lunches ready and made sure we had our homework, while half watching the morning news. The War, Watergate, NASA and The cold war were the big topics. But soon it would all be eclipsed by Nixon and Watergate. Erlichman, Dean, Cox, Haldeman and others. Soon, we were even talking about it in class. The effects were pervasive, and divisive. "never trust anyone over 30", "remember may 4" and other slogans were popular. The pressure to get rid of Nixon was intense, and eventually even the Republicans realized Nixon had to go. With the Impeachment hearings moving through Congress, a delegation of GOP Senators went up to the White House. One witness later described Nixon as a "Cornered Weasel." Nowadays, we have Donald Trump, who wants so badly to be seen as a Tough Guy, but who even a casual observer would see is not a Tough Guy, but a Weasel.
Where is the modern day version of the three who took that walk up to the White House to beard Nixon in his den ? We need a modern day version of Scott, Goldwater and Rhodes. Unfortunately, it looks today as if McConnell , Cornyn and McCarthy simply haven't got the belly for it. Although I tend to doubt that The Weasel in Chief would resign if they bid him to. He would simply continue on, hacking holes in the bottom of the Ship of State.

2018 Midterm Elections

I don't care who you support, I want you to get out and Vote Tuesday November 6 2018.

This is of vital importance. If you are registered to vote, get off your butt and go vote! 

      Personally, I despise Donald Trump and everything he stands for.  But I want to set my personal preferences aside for a moment.*

     The means by which any democratic republic functions is when those served by the Government make their wants and needs known to those elected to represent them. The main way of doing this is by voting. Electing people who will carry out their wishes. If you do not vote, your desires will never be counted. If you don't work to elect people who will represent your needs and wishes, you will never see them come to fruition. If you do not bother to get off your backside and vote, you will have given up your chance to affect the outcome of future events. You will also have forfeited your right to complain. Do not fail in this. It takes less than an hour.  If you think supporting Trump is the way to go, then go and put your vote where your mouth is. If, on the other hand, you support things the GOP hates, then go put your vote where your mouth is.


*in the interests of full disclosure, I intend to vote for every Democrat I can, because the GOP has shown themselves to be downright un-American. I have almost never voted for the straight ticket before. -- DLC.   

Are you the guy who's constantly complaining that voting's no use "because they control everything?" Well, here's a couple thoughts for you: First, off, if They control everything, why did they spend upwards of 5 billion dollars in the last election cycle. (not counting all the free publicity the news outfits gave people) Think about that for a moment. Five Thousand Million Dollars. It's like 50 pallets worth of money. if it were all rigged as you say, why would they waste 5 billion dollars getting Donald Trump elected ?

Second: Democracy isn't just getting off your butt and voting once every four years. It's hard work. using email, blogs, twitter, phone calls, word of mouth and whatever else you can to get out the word about the candidates or ballot issues you support. It's getting off your butt and actually running for office yourself, if you've got the wherewithal and the stamina for it. 

(I have none of those, personally.) 

And think of this: The current President was elected with 25.5% of the vote.  In other words, about 46.9% of those who could have voted sat on their butts and didn't. They were too lazy to (in Arizona at least) go to a web site, fill out an-e-form and hit send, and then when their ballot came, all they needed to do was draw lines connecting arrows with a black pen or marker. It takes like 10 minutes of steady work that any 5 year old could manage. (Arizona allows vote-by-mail for anyone who's a registered voter and who applies for a mail-in ballot.)

Teal Deer Version:

Not enough people vote.

More people need to get involved

More people need to run for office.

Big Money is dangerous but they don't actually own it all.

 
The Numbers :
231,556,622 eligible voters.
46.9% didn't vote.
25.6% voted for Clinton.
25.5% voted for Trump.Nov 9, 2016

Could it really be the twilight's last gleaming ?

In the near future, Donald J. Trump (whom I gave the mafia nickname "Donnie the Cheeto" )

May very well be facing impeachment and removal from office, in the first such case since the Republicans attempted to do so with Bill Clinton over alleged perjury.
I remember the sense of disillusionment many people had after Richard Nixon resigned hours ahead of being impeached and removed from office. Many of those who supported Trump fit the same demographic as those who supported Nixon. But how are they going to react to Trump's being impeached and removed from office ? (will Trump save face by resigning first, or has he no shame?) Many Nixon supporters were shocked and dismayed to find that their man had lied in furtherance of a criminal conspiracy. Will the current generation feel similar, or will they simply deny the truth and demand that Trump be allowed to continue in office regardless of criminal offenses ? Will Trump actually have the blatant effrontery to pardon himself and demand to be allowed to remain in office ? What does the reality-based community do if he does ? Will Trump actually foment a constitutional crisis ? Will he have to be forcibly ousted ? Will we actually have descended into the gutter of the banana republic ? Will the United States become the failed state Steve Bannon wants ? This could be the most trying test of The United States since the Civil War. 
Yet, I remain hopeful. I suppose I have become a "glass is half full" guy. But look -- Trump must go. and anyone else who was in on the con must also go. We also need to revamp our elections systems so that no future tampering attempts can breach their security. 

Remember, you may be pledging allegiance to the flag, but more importantly you're pledging to the Republic for which it stands, and to the ideals which this republic was founded on. If we forget or dismiss these ideals, then the flag means nothing. After all, without the principles and ideals the founding fathers believed in, the flag is just an empty symbol. If we allow ourselves to forget those ideals, then all the men and women who fought and died for them will have done so in vain. They didn't fight and die for "let's steal the Iraqi oil" or "let's make the Muslims lick our boots", they stood up when someone had to stand up, and they fought for the things Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Adams and others conceived, the things in the preamble to the Constitution of the United States, which I had to memorize as a schoolboy. "We the people, in order to form a more perfect union, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America. "

These, in the day when heaven was falling . . .

        In 1917 A.E. Housman wrote the short poem "An epitaph on an army of mercenaries."(you can read the poem here)
He was using the word mercenaries ironically, describing the professional soldiers of the British Expeditionary Force, who were all but slaughtered by overwhelming numbers of German forces. Their existence as a unit was ended after the battle of Ypres in 1914, but they did manage to halt the German offensive. The world has used mercenary soldiers since the time of the Spartans, who, having little in the way of resources, traded in soldiers instead.

The Dog Whistle and the Scum who Hear it.

They aren't actually dogs. calling them that is an insult to decent canines the world over, but it's politically known as the "Dog Whistle" because it's a special whistle tuned to above human hearing that dogs can hear and we can't. 

A last minute plea for the Republic.

Friends, I do not usually indulge in panic, and I'm not going to now. But I want to talk to you about a problem that threatens the very heart of our Republic. 

I am speaking about this incident of the Russian hacking of, and interference in, the late Presidential election. Here, I speak not as a partisan, but as an American. The current way in which the United States of America selects who is to be President and Vice President of the United States is complex, but it boils down to this:  The people vote to choose partisan Electors who then meet after the election in what's called The Electoral College. This body was created originally to prevent some influential demagogue -- a leader in a democracy who gains popularity by exploiting prejudice and ignorance among the common people, whipping up the passions of the crowd and shutting down reasoned deliberation -- from seizing power. It was also intended to limit the possible influence of foreign powers in American internal politics. In this instance we have both of those problems. We have Donald J Trump, the demagogue's demagogue, doing all of those things in the definition. But it's the second thing that is really important:

In sickness and in health, racism still sucks.

In 2012 I had a nasty case of Colitis. After 2 days of misery I was compelled to head to the Emergency Dept. of the local hospital (Banner Thunderbird) where I was treated by a professional, friendly and mostly polite staff who treated me with respect and granted me as much human dignity as they could. (with someone having bloody diarrhea every 30 or so minutes it couldn't have been easy or pleasant, even though I made it to the toilet on my own every time.) But what I want to focus on is this: the woman who did my x-rays was of middle-eastern descent and did her job while wearing a Muslim head-scarf. I did not berate her for following her religious dogma, or tell her she was a terrorist, or yell at her and tell her to get out of "my" country. You see, even though I do not personally agree with the dictates of Islam, and I believe it is a restrictive, misogynistic religion, I am an American. A USA-Ian if you prefer. I was brought up to believe in the Constitution of the United States, and I was taught that A person's religion does not matter so long as it does not interfere with the performance of their duties at their job or influence adversely how they interact with other Americans. (USA-Ians if you prefer.) This woman clearly did not worry that I was not a Muslim. She did not care. She did her job efficiently and with a friendly demeanor. I thanked her for doing a good job, and she nodded back at me and went about her business. So, here's a lesson for those of you who think "Now that Trump's won we can get rid of all this "political correctness" and say what we think about these *people* : No, you can't. You can hate all you want and nobody will stop you. But if you act on your hate and indulge in verbal or physical abuse, you will be stopped. If not by police, by me. I'm old and not the man I used to be, but I will stand between you and them and defy you to scream at me. I'm an old Wolf but I am still a Wolf and I will not stand by while you act like a sniveling coward. You may have some vestige of the courage of your convictions but you have no real courage, or you would do as I do and walk without fear in the world, and nod to all in passing, without allowing your fear to chase you into anger at someone merely for what religion they follow or how they dress or who were their ancestors. Grow up. Grow some spine, and remember, if you cannot be welcoming to all, you can at least be tolerant of all.