I’d just like to take a moment and recognize the contribution of the morally deficient, anti-vax cons. Through their tireless efforts, COVID-19 has managed to rampage, mutate and rampage again, and mutate yet again, rampage to follow. The anti-vaxxers will stick to their stubborn, selfish, wrongheaded, and anti-social refusal – again – and COVID-19 will be off and running – again. This time in the guise of Omicron.

We, the responsible people, will have to wear our masks even longer. The economy will suffer another setback. The medical system will be overworked even longer. More people will die. And none of it would have been possible if not for the unflagging narcissism of the few, the inconsiderate, the malevolent…

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Speaking of self-centered jerks, Ghislaine Maxwell’s trial is starting. If you’re somehow unaware, Maxwell is accused of helping groom the underage women Jeffery Epstein and his powerful associates abused. Apparently, she even participated in the abuse from time to time. The judge, Alison Nathan, is taking a firm hold of the trial. She’s claiming she doesn’t want the trial to become a surrogate for the trial Epstein would have received had he not suspiciously turned up dead in his maximum security prison cell.

Do you remember the DVDs? According to the New York Times, during a search of Epstein’s properties, authorities discovered a cache of DVDs labeled with the names of who was on it. They were labeled like: [underage girl]+[abuser]. Epstein’s houses were apparently extensively wired to record activities, particularly in the bedrooms and bathrooms. I suspect this whole thing will be handled as a sex-trafficking case and it should. But it seems to me it’s a blackmail scheme in the end. The girls were just the bait. Since the original announcement of the existence of said DVDs we haven’t heard much more about them. I wonder if we’ll hear anything about them during the trial.

These are some rich and powerful men caught up in this scam. They’ll use their wealth and power to protect themselves. My guess is, we’ll never hear anything about the DVDs or any mention of the men on them. Because the trial will work so hard to protect the men, it will be easier to defend Maxwell. Her defense team is trying to pretend Maxwell is only being prosecuted as a proxy to Epstein. I think Maxwell was fully in on the scheme. This should be an interesting trial, assuming it’s allowed to play out properly.

But trials playing out properly is not necessarily a given in this once-great nation…

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One that did, eventually, was the murder trial for a black man who was murdered for jogging while black. I was a little surprised to find that the original prosecutor in the Ahmaud Arbery murder, Jackie Johnson, declined to prosecute. Apparently, she knew and had worked with one of the killers, Greg McMichael. She has now been indicted for misconduct. She claims she was lied to by the investigating officers. I can’t see how she can be charged if she acted on incorrect information she had but they HAVE charged her so…I’d guess they have some evidence she knew Arbery was not out committing crimes. That was just her cover story to protect her good ol’ boy, racist friend. Might that make her an accessory after the fact?

The jury didn’t take long to find the defendants guilty. Apparently, the evidence was overwhelming. That’s going to hurt Johnson’s case. She might have had more wiggle room if there had been difficulty coming to conclusions but there wasn’t. If it was so obvious to the jury, why wasn’t it obvious to the prosecutor? She saw what she wanted to see and refused to look at things she didn’t want to see.

She almost got away with it, too. Or rather, helped the McMichael’s and William “Roddie” Bryan Jr get away with it. Apparently, after the shooting, rumors started flying, locally, about the shooters. The three thought they could quell the rumors by making available a video shot by Bryan – you know, to “document” how awesome they were in their conduct. Leave it to a dumbass racists to provide the detailed evidence against themselves. The video showed the opposite of awesome conduct and once it became available, there was a public outcry that the prosecutor had declined to prosecute. The Governor of Georgia had to get involved to make sure a trial even took place.

It seems Johnson, Greg and Travis McMichael and William Bryan Jr all agreed that Arbery was probably guilty of something being all covered with that black skin as he was. Then, as the trial progressed, one of the defense attorneys suggested the jury was racially biased. Eleven white people and one African-American and STILL the guy suggested the jury was racially biased.

The killers have all said they plan to appeal their outcome. They seem truly confused. All they did was see a black man, kill him, then come up with a cover story that didn’t hold water under investigation. My guess is, Mr. Arbery would have preferred a different outcome as well – only…there’s no way to “appeal” being murdered…

See? I CAN learn. Based on what we’ve just seen, Darrell E. Brooks, 39 – the person who drove his SUV into a crowd gathered for a parade, killing 5 and injuring 48 – will claim self defense, right? I mean, all he has to say is that he feared for his life. There WAS a crowd there and they WERE trying to stop him. Hell, someone even took a shot at him. How could he NOT fear for his life? I guess the judge will rule that the people who died can’t be called victims. Since we just saw that, apparently, Wisconsin law says a confrontation doesn’t start until the accused feels scared, one must assume the courts will set the same standard in this case.

Sure, it’s stupid but it’s Wisconsin. Apparently, that’s how their laws work…

I suppose the reason the cons are being so stubborn about the “three men attacked poor young Kyle” position is that it fits so well with their long story about how arming everyone makes everyone safer. As always, the truth is, more guns equals more deaths of innocents. One guys fires, ten guys pull out their guns hoping to be the good guy with a gun. Now eleven people are in a gunfight, shooting at each other. Who’s the good guy? Who’s the bad guy? A person Kyle was with that night actually fired a round. People heard the shot and saw Kyle there with his gun. They made a logical but wrong connection. The shot must have come from the gun they see. The simple reality is, many people in the area thought he was an active shooter and tried to disarm him.

The three men didn’t attack Kyle all together or at once, either. After Kyle killed Rosenbaum, he ran down the street. Others on the scene started shouting down the street that Kyle was, indeed, an active shooter. People tried to disarm him. In court, we got to hear what KYLE thought they might do. The same consideration wasn’t given to Kyle’s victims. THEY thought HE was the bad guy. In a very real sense, the people Kyle killed were in self-defense mode…and they thought they were defending themselves – and others – from Kyle.

You know why the confusion? Because Kyle was there with a gun. I don’t care how many times you say it or how fervently you pretend, more guns does NOT equal more safety. The truth is, I thought the trial was very carefully orchestrated to protect young Kyle, or rather, protect the NRA’s vision of “gun rights.” As the trial progressed, I became resigned to the idea that the young killer was going to walk free, with the exception of the illegal gun possession charge which I thought that oh-so-coddling judge would sentence to time served or probation or, perhaps, just a severe dressing down. The defense offered an out. They said Kyle COULD have that gun because the barrel was the right length for hunting. So, after closing arguments, the judge accepted that escape and threw the gun charge out. So the question never got asked, if Kyle is going to skate based on an hunting exception, what was Kyle hunting in downtown Kenosha that night?

Okay, so the verdict is the verdict and we’ll all learn to live with it. Well, those left alive, anyway…

Greta Thunberg is an 18 year old environmental activist who has come to prominence by denouncing the words-but-no-actions made by most countries regarding climate change. She knows that it’s HER generation that is going to suffer the worst consequences of the avarice of my generation. She watches and even attends these climate summits all over the world. She sails on a boat to get to them. Cons hate her. You know, because she’s speaking the truth and cons hate, hate, HATE truth…

There was this recent climate dog-and-pony show called the UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties or COP26. Lots of nations came together to discuss what could be done about climate change. The answer, of course, is nothing. Responding to climate change will affect profit models around the world and the people currently sitting in the most profitable positions would rather wipe out humanity than give up a dollar. Greta knows this. She recently tried to shame them into action by calling out their rhetoric.

Politicians KNOW that most people would rather see the climate corrected or at least controlled even if it means some rich person ends up a bit less rich. They KNOW that if they’re going to protect their phoney-baloney jobs they’ve got to at least pay lip service to climate change. So they have these meetings from time to time and make all these grand statements about what people and countries should do then set “targets” for some distant future “fix.” The young Miss Thunberg summed up the details: blah, blah, blah

She’s right. There will be LOTS of talk and many promises. There will be little to no meaningful action. Blah, blah, blah…

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One of the things lawyers do to benefit their clients is stall – slow things down, wait things out. Maybe a key witness dies. Maybe a file just sits on someone’s desk too long. Over time, people might forget details. Maybe Congress changes hands in the mid-terms and the Republicans won’t see any need to follow up on treason. Who knows?

I hear we’re supposed to be treated to the scene of Steve Bannon, the America-hating, Dumbass-enabling conservative traitor, surrendering to authorities on Monday in response to being indicted for Contempt of Congress. Some people and outlets are breathlessly awaiting the events. They seem to think Bannon is going to prison on Monday. Settle down a bit, will ya? He’ll go before a judge, plead ‘Not Guilty’ and be released. He’ll have dinner where ever he wants to on Monday night. THEN, his lawyers will stall. There will be a LOT of legal maneuvering. Who knows? Maybe Congress changes hands in the mid-terms and the Republicans won’t see any need to follow up on treason.

CheetoJesus, himself, is doing the same thing. He’s free to tell anybody – EVERYBODY – who will listen that he’s innocent and didn’t do anything wrong. But when he’s given the opportunity to prove he’s innocent and didn’t do anything wrong, he moves into “legal defense” mode and stalls. You know…like ANY innocent person might do. Who knows? Maybe Congress changes hands in the mid-terms and the Republicans won’t see any need to follow up on treason.

I saw Adam Schiff on ‘Real Time with Bill Maher’ from the twelfth of this month and he repeated all the old tropes and observations. Oh, it’s important for America. Maybe some of the Republicans might do the right thing. Putting pressure on Bannon will bring about larger results. Same ole, same ole, blah, blah, blah.

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On the same episode of Real Time, Bill Maher asked (again) if it was possible to get rid of the hatred and get Americans acting like Americans again – you know, the great American melting pot, his version of Rodney King’s “Can’t we all just get along?” There was much discussion. Blah, blah, blah. There will be no kumbaya moment so long as conservative media continues to foment dissension and discord by broadcasting America hatred dressed up as patriotism, anti-social behavior disguised as individual liberty, and moral collapse masquerading as moral superiority. America is suffering a class war right now and the One Percent is so far ahead, I fear the war was over and won (for them) before most Americans even realized they were under attack. Hell, many still don’t!

Thanks largely to Bill Clinton, the One Percent enjoys effective, near-perfect control over the media in the US. They WANT the divide. They LOVE the discord. They KNOW that a house divided cannot stand and they do not want this house to stand. They’ve rendered the cons morally stupid and the cons have been duped into defending those who mean them harm and fighting those they should ally themselves with. Cons are the One Percent’s first line of defense, despite the fact that cons are working against their own interests.

So, the answer, Bill, is no. We CAN’T all just get along. Moneyed interests don’t want us to get along. It might interfere with their money interests. This once-great nations needs the return of the Fairness Doctrine (dropped by Reagan) and the return to rules that limited ownership within markets (dropped by Clinton). By and large, I believe Americans would do the right things with decent information. Sadly, these days, all we’re getting – everywhere we turn – is bunk.

Personally, I think Greta nailed the perfect epitaph for humanity: blah, blah, blah…

I’ve heard cons braying about how Covid has killed more people under Biden than it did under the Dumbass. It’s part of their stupid ‘everything got worse on January 21st’ bullshit story. (Cons are conditioned to believe that everything is always perfect when Republicans are in charge and everything sucks otherwise…) The idea that Covid 19 may have killed more since January 21, 2021 might even be true, though I’ve noticed they count from January 1 and not January 21. It doesn’t really matter. I suspect that more people WILL die of Covid while Biden is President but it’s still the Dumbass’s fault.

Think of one of PG&E’s profit-making wildfires. The fire burns. Someone calls 911. Firefighters show up and start fighting the fire. When it started, the fire was only in the area of PG&E’s neglected equipment but it spread. One COULD make the case that the fire got bigger AFTER the firefighters showed up, too. But that just ignores the failure and neglect that allowed the fire to get started in the first place…

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I watched an HBO documentary called ‘Four Hours At The Capitol.’ I highly recommend it. I kept finding myself surprised to hear the insurgents claims about what they were doing and why they were doing it. Much of what was said was self-serving, of course, but very often, the cons had me believing that THEY believed. They saw their efforts to storm the Capitol, kill the Vice-President, and capture Congress critters as exactly equivalent to the Boston Tea Party. (Those are my words. None of them used that comparison…)

Now, I’m going to tell you the truth, here. I don’t really have any heartburn with the idea that average Americans might one day have to fight back against the government. Every day, we have to watch the decline-by-choice of a once-great nation under the weight of corruption and failure. Every day, the idea that Americans might have to attack the Capitol and arrest corrupt Congress critters looks more likely. But I DO think one should have evidence that the need exists. These attackers didn’t have any. After 60 court cases ended in “no evidence,” they attacked anyway. They preferred the word of a proven liar and attacked their own country, the one they claim to love so much. In my mind, it sounded like a Christian saying they love Jesus so much they can’t WAIT to nail him back up on the cross. Still, stupid as it seems, these people were convinced they were the true patriots doing their duty to the nation. They thought they would receive pardons. They seem truly shocked that they’re now facing criminal charges for their criminal behavior. Their President TOLD them to attack, fercrissakes…

I imagine it’s WHY they’re getting such light sentences. These are adults, responsible for their own actions. SOME of the rally-goers stopped at the gates and refused to attack, feeling like things were going too far. That, alone, demonstrates, to me, that it was POSSIBLE to know the assault was the wrong thing to do. The insurgents have to pay a price for their actions. But the thing is, if I was sitting on the bench, I would HAVE to take into account they had been told by the President of the United States of America to fight like hell and attack the Capitol if they loved their country – and thinking is not the cons strong suit. So I understand sending most of the minions to prison, slap-on-the-wrist style. It’s the LEADERS who need to do hard time. Donnie the Dumbass, Dumbass Jr, Giuliani, some media personalities, several actual members of Congress. THEY need to go to jail. But they won’t, especially 45. We don’t arrest ex-Presidents regardless of their crimes. Ever.

The concept is, if one party starts arresting people for actual crimes the OTHER party will start arresting people for trumped up “crimes” and the whole thing will collapse under the weight of fake tits for real tats. I think the thing that bothered me the MOST about the insurrection and the attempted coup is the revelation that this once-great nation basically ran on the honor system. I guess the founders thought honor would be enough to protect the country but that ended after Nixon. The Republicans tried to protect their guy but as the evidence mounted, they did the right thing for the country. After that, though, the powers that be realized they had to eliminate honor if they were ever going to recover their aristocracy. Fortunately, for them, dishonorable men were readily available and MORE than happy to trade the country for money.

Foisted upon us was a parade of rogues and villains that started with Ronald Reagan and included Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich and Bush 43 and Dick Cheney and Karl Rove and CheetoJesus and Bill Barr and Mitch McConnell and a cast of miscreants too numerous to mention. (Before you ask, Obama was basically a useless placeholder. I think Bush 41 was the last President the country had that cared more about the country than a political party…) The string of scoundrels has been far too much for the integrity of the country to bear. Corruption moves faster than correction.

Fair warning: the final result was NOT January 6, 2021. That was just the latest chapter. The final damage will be shown in the next “election” when NOBODY will accept the outcome. Cons won’t accept any outcome they don’t like and thinking Americans have been watching one red state after another pretend something is wrong with the system while they eliminate democracy. If the whole system was based on trust and integrity, and all Americans know that the trust and integrity have been ripped from the system, there is no system. I don’t know where we go from there but I suggest you keep your powder dry…