Author: MyBaconPress

Doing The Right Thing – And Not…

by MyBaconPress

I guess the right is viewing it as a flip-flop but if you didn’t know Ole’ Sleepy Joe was going to pardon his son, Hunter, you were living in a dream world. (And, as it happens, MAGA is starting to discover the world they’re expecting is, in fact, a dream. A pipe dream, to be sure, but that’s still a dream…) I’m glad Joe did it.

I’m not defending Hunter’s actions. He broke the (very minor) law and a punishment was recommended that was in keeping with how these things are handled. So, first, there’s a “how these things are handled,” suggesting Hunter Biden is not the only guy to check off the box that says he’s not buying a gun while being a drug user and, as a rule, people don’t go to jail for it. Well, unless they’re the son of a President currently under attack by political opposition.

When MAGA heard Hunter was going to get the same thing other people get for the same offense, they were outraged and insisted on something worse. You know, because of how much they hate, hate, hate abuses of the law. So, Hunter found himself in deeper trouble than he should have been in – for political reasons. Why, it’s almost as if the cons were weaponizing the law…

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I was born in the LA basin and I don’t remember ever seeing a truly blue sky until I was about eight years old – when we moved out of the LA basin. There was a time in this once-great nation when the air pollution in some cities was so bad, people were dying of smoking-related diseases – even though they had never smoked. The air quality was so bad, there was a concern it would cause birth defects. There was a river near Cleveland, Ohio, the Cuyahoga River. It was choking with chemical contaminants. It was said that if you accidentally fell into that river, you went straight to the hospital – and God help you. It had spontaneously burst into flames.
“Wait, did you just say a river burst into flames?”
“Yes. A river burst into flames because of chemical contaminants.”

Cons like to pretend these issues should be handled on a case by case basis. As it happens, that had been the way various cities and states had been forced to handle it prior to 1970. The case-by-case approach had created a mish-mash of rules that made it hard to know the law in any given area – and that made it difficult to enforce the law. Mindless human activity, combined with very mindful corporate activity had damaged the environment so badly, it was becoming unsafe to breath the air, drink the water, or dig in dirt.

So, in 1970, Republican Richard Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency. The idea was to pull together responsibility for the various environmental efforts from around the country and set common standards. He even spoke of the need in his State of the Union Address from January of that year. Remember, this is a Republican speaking:

“Restoring nature to its natural state is a cause beyond party and beyond factions. It has become a common cause of all the people of this country. It is a cause of particular concern to young Americans, because they more than we will reap the grim consequences of our failure to act on programs which are needed now if we are to prevent disaster later.

Clean air, clean water, open spaces-these should once again be the birthright of every American. If we act now, they can be.

We still think of air as free. But clean air is not free, and neither is clean water. The price tag on pollution control is high. Through our years of past carelessness we incurred a debt to nature, and now that debt is being called.”

Yes, there is still work to do. Corporations are forever finding ways to pollute as “cost cutting measures.” But we came a LONG way in cleaning things up. The EPA has the power to clean up areas that had become SO polluted they couldn’t sustain human life anymore, the so-called Superfund sites. (Look up Love Canal.) The companies that DID the polluting – when it wasn’t the military – often just walked away. Too costly to clean up their mess, you know. So the EPA forced them to.

Hmm, the EPA has the power to force corporations to clean up after themselves? Oh, the huMANity! But…but…what about the cost?!? What about maximizing shareholder value? What about the plight of the CEO, who might have to try and get by on only $350 million dollars a year if he has to clean up after himself? Maybe less. Oh, weep for the struggle.

All of that probably explains why corporations haven’t been too keen on the EPA since the day it was formed. As a result, corporations have wanted the EPA gone pretty much since the day it was formed. Fortunately, they have Donald Trump, now.

He hasn’t even taken power yet and his people are already gleefully attacking the agency, working to weaken it’s ability to do it’s job if they can’t get rid of it entirely. They plan to attack scientists who disagree with Trump, who knows nothing. They plan to eliminate protections from political interference with the agency’s work. They don’t LIKE that the EPA knows about – and works to prevent – climate change.

They think if they can make the EPA stop warning about climate change, climate change will just…go away. They think this because they randomly decided climate change is a fraud – even as summers get hotter and hotter and winters get wetter and wetter and storms get stronger and droughts last longer. LIVING the reality of climate change isn’t enough to convince some people climate change is real.

So, here we go. The thing is, climate change IS real. Denial won’t change that. With these actions, efforts to protect the environment will fall off and corporations (and you can bet your ass on this) will start dumping toxic wastes and other contaminants all over the environment as quickly as possible. Sure, it kills everything and everyone, but it saves money. Get your priorities straight, people!

I guess if we’re looking for “bright” sides, what I can come up with is, now that MAGA is sidelining the EPA, humanity will likely NOT survive long enough to suffer many of the other extremes I hear MAGA threatening.
“That’s a bright side?”
I suspect it’s a bright as we’re going to get from this crowd…

Attacking The Defenseless…

by MyBaconPress

Do you remember the beginning of this century, when greedy corporate interests crashed the economy through corruption and fraud but managed to blame field workers? One of the results of that crime was a new agency in government, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), a federal watchdog that helps protect consumers from predatory financial practices. Keywords? “…helps protect consumers from predatory financial practices.”

So, naturally, that’s one of the areas Elon sees as the place to cut. He wants to just “delete” the CFPB. It turns out, predatory lenders don’t LIKE an agency that protects consumers from predatory financial practices. Go figure. Fortunately, they have totally-in-touch-with-the-common-man, extremely weird Elon Musk in their corner to help protect them from the dangers the victims pose to the predators.

I suspect this will be the most successful and repeated pattern of the incoming chaos; harm to the most vulnerable…

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Speaking of which, Mike Rounds (R – of course) has introduced a bill to eliminate the Department of Education. The thing is, he introduced it to the current congress, not the GOP fevered congress coming in January. I wonder why he did that. Cons don’t even have a majority in this congress. Why not wait until the next?

Either way, apparently, he needs a super-majority in congress to get that bill through, whether this congress or the next. He says he thinks he can do it through reconciliation, meaning he would only need 51 votes but others say he can’t do it that way. We’ll all find out together.

The Department of Education is just one of the departments Trump has attacked. Shortly after taking this “election,” he said the education department was staffed by many people who “in many cases, hate our children.” He’ll have a briefing, soon, explaining to him what the Department of Education does. Then he said, “we want states to run the education of our children, because they’ll do a much better job of it.”

Some of them will, sure. Some won’t. Kids in Massachusetts will do just fine. Kids from West Virginia? Well, thay stil wont no howe to spel. But, in fairness, they don’t now. Still, just in case he can’t eliminate the DOE that way, Trump is all set to attack on another front: he put Linda McMahon in charge of the department.
“Who?”
“You know. That super-qualified wife of the guy who ran big-time wrestling. She doesn’t like the DOE because it makes ‘some people think they’re so smart.'” Much of what the DOE does can be shuffled to other departments but some of it will fall through the cracks.

In my opinion, one of the more important functions of the Department of Education is ensuring and enforcing fair access to education for disable students. That part will likely disappear. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that one of the first groups the cons have chosen to attack is disabled kids. Who, after all, is more vulnerable than that?

I’m not sure WHY this next bit suddenly popped into my head. Do you think there’s some sort of message, here?

“For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

44 “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

45 “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’” (Matthew 25:42)

I’ll tell you this: you’d think the “let’s put the Bible everywhere” crowd would have SOME idea of what’s in the book they pretend to love so much…

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The lowly Raiders were in a good position to knock off the top-seeded Kansas City Chiefs with a field goal. On a critical third down to position the ball for the kick, the Raiders center snapped the ball early. The QB wasn’t ready for it. The ball fell, uncontrolled, to the ground and a Chiefs player fell on it. Bummer for the Raider fans. But, no. An official had blown a whistle, ending the play. He ran onto the field indicating a false start. A false start is an automatic penalty. The opposing team doesn’t get to accept or decline. In effect, the play just “didn’t count.” The ball just gets moved and the team gets the attempt again.

We all saw the indicator from the official. It was clearly a false start signal. But a false start call would have meant the fumble never happened and would have left the ball in the hands of the Raiders. A false start call would have allowed the Raiders to attempt the game-winning field goal, after all, and, perhaps, hand the Chiefs their second loss of the season. A false start, in this case, would certainly have messed up the betting by having a deep underdog unexpectedly defeat the super-favorite.

That’s no problem for the NFL. They just had the officials huddle up and “discuss” the penalty. The zebras came up with an effective workaround: they called an illegal shift. That little “adjustment” allowed the Chiefs to decide if the penalty was accepted or not. They declined the penalty (meaning the play counted) because one of their players had fallen on the ball. In short, the NFL just…took the ball from the Raiders and gave it to the Chiefs, sealing the Chiefs “victory.”

People are STILL waiting for some explanation from the NFL. I suspect no explanation will be forthcoming. How do they “explain” controlling the outcome of games in order to maximize gains from their ‘Fanduel’ partnership?

I’ll tell you this: It’s not “betting” when the outcome is a foregone conclusion…

Corruption Plus Greed…

by MyBaconPress

Wow, it looks like people in the Trump orbit plan to enrich themselves in their positions. Who could have guessed? We’ve already seen Boris Epshteyn, who wants people to pay him – substantially – to put in a good word with Trump for a job. Now we get Elon, who, let’s face it, needs an infusion of cash in order to make it through the week. Sometimes, he’s the richest man in the world. ALWAYS, he “needs” a little more. To my mind, that’s the same mental illness that makes a person weigh in at 600 pounds…

You see, thanks to conservative deregulation, the larger internet providers have been buying up many of the smaller providers and making decisions about where profits can be mined and where there just aren’t enough people to justify certain expenditures. It’s the corporate way. Because of those calculations, the large internet providers won’t lay fiber optic cable in some areas. Not enough return on their investment.

So, the Biden administration put together $42.4 billion dollars to help rural communities hook up to various high speed internet systems through smaller, local services the large services haven’t swallowed – yet. Elon’s Starlink program didn’t qualify. It’s too slow. So, naturally, Elon thinks the program should be shelved. I mean, he doesn’t qualify, why should anyone qualify, right? Sure, he could have tried to speed up his system to meet the requirement but that would be hard so, better to just eliminate the requirement.

Fortunately, the areas that won’t have that zippy broadband because Elon sees a great place to cut funding will still have access to Elon’s crappier Starlink service. Oh, and it should be noted that as people sign up, the service is getting even crappier…er…slower. Do you see any problems with the idea of a richie-rich guy – a guy who can never be satisfied, a guy who only understands ‘more, more, more’ – having control over the fortunes of his competitors?

Ah hell, who knows, maybe he’ll be visited by three ghosts, here, pretty soon…

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Trump ran on, among other things, a promise to impose backbreaking, VERY destructive tariffs on pretty much everybody. Some of the countries he has mentioned specifically, have pushed back, announcing that if Trump DOES invoke his ill-advised tariffs, they would do the same. Let the trade war begin, right? Fortunately, Trump has been having phone calls with these countries and now has an excuse to NOT impose those crippling tariffs.

He can just tell MAGA that he got on the phone with these people, talked real tough to them, and they collapsed in the face of his awesomeness so now the tariffs won’t be necessary. The truth, of course, is that his entire campaign was a lie and no tariffs were ever necessary so what he needed was an excuse. Now he pretends his phone calls have solved the problem even before he took office and conservative media will support that story like it’s true and MAGA will eat it up with a spoon.

But at least he may not impose those tariffs, aggravating inflation and sending the economy into the tail-spin he managed during his last maladministration. He’ll find another way to crash the economy, you just watch…

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I haven’t been writing about the NFL as much as I expected to this season. That’s mostly because my Niners suck…er…I mean, ‘are struggling…’ this season. But the thing that is making the game almost unwatchable? Effing penalty flags! Oh! Em! Gee! It’s gotten SO bad, if two plays happen consecutively without a flag, it’s astounding. (I’m not sure it has happened even once this season, two consecutive plays without a flag…) Sometimes the broadcaster goes back and shows the violation and it’s clearly a good call. Sometimes the broadcaster goes back and shows the “violation” and it’s clearly NOT a good call. Sometimes, they don’t even show the problem. The game just moves on. Slowly. Oh, my gods, so slowly…

I continue to believe the NFL is manipulating the outcomes of games via their officiating crews. It’s likely more a matter of point shaving and beating the spread than dictating winners and losers but it STILL helps fortify their “investment” into ‘FanDuel,’ the online gambling site with which the NFL has “partnered” to take your money.

Not to put too fine of a point on it, if you think you’re “betting” on NFL game outcomes, you’re not. You’re really just posting how much money you intend to gift the NFL today. Don’t be an idiot. NEVER “bet” in a situation where your “bet” is controlled by the group who stands to profit if you lose.

But, hey, at least the Niners don’t have to contend with Head Coach Matt Eberflus, the Head Coach of the Chicago Bears. No. Strike that. The EX Head Coach of the Chicago Bears. That guy. The other day, I watched, perhaps, the greatest single failure of coaching I think I’ve ever seen -hyperbole is very big in sports – and it was all on Coach Eberflus.

All he had to do was line his team up for a field goal attempt to tie the game and send it to overtime, giving his Bears a reasonable chance to win. His Quarterback got sacked, making the field goal a greater challenge, but there was still time on the clock and he still had a timeout. ANY other team would have tried to position the ball a little closer then taken their shot at the field goal. Eberflus…did something else.

He very carefully used up the time left on the clock and then ran a desperation play that failed as time ran out, losing the game by three points. You can read that sentence over and over and, if you know the game, it will never make any more sense than it did the first time you read it. But that IS what he did. The team ran back to the locker room after losing with that timeout in their pocket. It was one of the most amazingly bad clock management moments in the history of the game. And the Bears agreed, parting company with Eberflus the next day.

Some guys just never make it as Head Coaches and I believe Eberflus is one of those. I wonder how many people in Chicago will forever refer to him as “Everflub…”

United We Stand…

by MyBaconPress

Union is better than non-union. Please read that carefully. I did NOT say unions are perfect in every measurable way. I said union is better than non-union. Right now, we have a corporate media trying to control our thoughts, feeding us misinformation that serves the One Percent whether that harms the rest of us or not. Right now, our society is awash in failed, outdated thinking and just plain bad concepts – because the One Percent want us to believe this really is the best way, even though it clearly is not.

It works a lot. They made huge inroads in false narratives people believe. But it’s heartening to see that it doesn’t work all the time. I’m referring to the fact that, despite the false story-on-repeat that unions are ineffective, corrupt, and serve only to take hard-working people’s money, unions are making a comeback, and it’s about time. The most recent story I’ve heard about is a Whole Foods in Philadelphia filing for a union vote.

A long, long time ago, I realized that the thing that MADE the “good jobs” the good jobs was that they were UNION jobs. It was one of the things corporations used to bust unions – just send the job to some foreign country and let a captive child (or adult) do the work for pennies a day. Great for the corporation’s bottom line, bad for American workers.

We became a “service economy” and the thing about service jobs is that they HAVE TO BE done here. How do you get a fast food worker to hand you your fries from China? Most of the service jobs in America had not been unionized. Of course, they were seen as low paying jobs and people accepted it for a long time. But ends gotta meet. Life keeps getting more and more expensive (because corporations don’t know the meaning of the word “enough.”) and something has to give. Finally, people are starting to realize that the “something” that has to give has to be the corporations that have all the money, and unions are the way to get that done.

To be sure, with this last “election,” the One Percent has pretty much unwound this once-great nation to pre-New Deal days. (We’re going to have to re-fight nearly ninety years worth of gains.) THAT means the fight for unions is going to look like the old fights. That commonly meant physical fights. It means the companies involved will do any and every underhanded and sneaky thing they can do to stop the unions. Because we’re now a fascist nation (the marriage of big business and government), the government will help the rich.

But – not to put too fine of a point on it – the workers are, well, the workers. WE generate the money they keep. How many Amazon orders did Bezos personally ship last year? He doesn’t get to BE the self-described genius if he has to ship all the orders himself. He needs workers and, really, he needs them more than the workers need him.

Yes, our society is largely built around getting a job but that can change if it has to and the working class will do better than the upper class. We’re not afraid of hard work and we work together better. (We have practice at that.) Besides, there’s nothing stopping a working class person from starting a business. It’s just that right now, thanks to conservative driven deregulation (and the aforementioned fascism), it’s harder for small businesses to compete.

Really, the only power the working class has IS as workers and if we collectively decide not to do their work, what do they do? Take our homes? Hell, they’re doing that anyway. Make things more expensive? Well under way. They harm us with the money WE generate for them and a union is the perfect, non-violent way to force a little equity. I did NOT say equality. Equity. Fairness.

I’ll tell you this: I hope to see this union movement keep moving forward. You want to talk about taking our country back? How about if the working class takes the country back from the New Robber Barons by managing our labor?

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There’s a guy, Boris Epshteyn, who works for Trump. He stands accused of trying to extort money from people who want to work in the Trump maladministration in exchange for putting in a good word with the boss. He’s not asking for petty cash or small change. He asked one guy for $100,000 dollars – every month! (It seems they expect these office holders to generate huge incomes from their positions and the boss needs his vig.)

Epshteyn says it isn’t true and dismisses the charges as “false and defamatory” (because of course he did), but several people have come forward to tell similar stories. I know, this is probably some left win propaganda, right?

Well, the story is compiled by lawyers working for Trump so, maybe not. It should be noted that as of this writing, the internal investigation that generated this finding has been concluded and there doesn’t seem to be any actions contemplated for Epshteyn beyond a kind of “probably not” denial. Apparently, this is the way the boss wants it.

Consider: if people who aren’t willing to pay aren’t getting the jobs, what does that say about the people who ARE getting them?

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I don’t know much about Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, but I like what I do know. Trump has been threatening a 25% tariff on Mexico if they don’t do something to stop the flow of immigrants across our so-called “open border.” So, she shared a little truth with him. Mexico IS doing something to stem the tide. They have an entire program dedicated to sending people back home before they ever get to our southern border – and it’s working.

Donald certainly won’t admit this, but apprehensions are down. In fact, in recent months we’ve seen fewer apprehensions than we saw during Trump’s own effort, meaning there are fewer people trying to cross illegally. In short, the problem has been addressed by Biden without tariffs and the programs in place on both sides of the border are having the desired effect. At this point, my biggest question is: why is this information coming out only now, AFTER the “election?”

But Donald doesn’t want to confess Biden’s success. Yet. Oh, he will. On January 22, 2025, he’s going to announce all the wonderful and awesome control we have on the border, now. He’ll cite numbers to prove it from 2024, when he wasn’t president but because he’ll be the ostensible president when he says it, MAGA will believe it was all him, all the time. Is there another way to say that? Oh, yeah. Trump will, as usual, take credit for other people’s work.

Oh, President Sheinbaum also pointed out that the flow of guns from America to Mexico is one of the main things supporting the illegal drug trade that flows back from Mexico. She suggested that if we did something about that, they could more readily do something about the drug problem. In short, she hit him with facts. I’m sure MAGA hates her now. You know their motto: if the facts don’t support us, kill the finder of the facts…

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The new year looms and it promises to be something of a rough ride, but we have today. I hope we can set aside differences and enjoy the day together. Have a little turkey. Watch a little football. Hang with the family, maybe. Enjoy the day. So, from My Bacon Press to you, I want to wish all my reader a very heartfelt, Happy Thanksgiving!

Not All Bad…

by MyBaconPress

There’s a Senator from Iowa, Joni Ernst, who is set to lead Trump’s new department, and possibly massive bureaucracy, the ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ for her state. She says she wants to make the federal government “squeal.” I hope she wasn’t envisioning the infamous scene from ‘Deliverance.’ But I’m curious what she did mean.

I expect all of this cost-cutting the GOP keeps talking about to fall on the weakest and most vulnerable citizens, in general. Oh, sure, they may make noise about cutting from programs that assist the wealthiest and government subsidies that benefit corporations but the wealthiest and the corporations have powerful voices in the government these days. (That’s the beauty of fascism, in their eyes.) THEY won’t lose out, so the weakest will be the scapegoats, right?

But, in fairness, the first program Ernst suggested dumping was this so-called high speed rail line in California. It’s probably the single largest boondoggle I’ve seen in the state for a long time. It’s MASSIVELY over budget. It has taken FAR longer to become active than originally projected. It was supposed to travel from one large population center to another but has since been pared down to travel between two places nobody needs to get to in a hurry.

Oh, and it’s NOT “high speed rail.” Not if you think if high speed as a bullet train. This one is expected to go faster than a regular commuter train but not nearly the speed of bullet trains of Japan or Europe. In short, I have opposed the pretended high speed rail project in California since I first heard of it but it just keeps going forward. I suppose there is a huge amount of money being funneled to a small number of self-described “important” people as long as the project continues, so the project continues.

Listen, I’d even go so far as to say I would support a high speed rail line that traveled from, say, LA to Sacramento or the bay area if it was a) high speed and b) functional. But this ain’t that. The project currently sucking up money has failed. It just won’t die…

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Okay, I confess, I have extreme trepidation about this incoming team. For the most part, it’s going to be ugly and most Americans – and much of the world – will suffer. But within that framework, there are going to be sort of “fun” things to watch. Like the inevitable battle of egos between Donnie and Elon.

Trump and Musk are, without a doubt, two of the most self-important blowhards the world has ever seen, will ever see. They BOTH see themselves as god-level geniuses with some kind of mystical vision that allows them to understand things the small folk just can’t. They never see anybody they love more than the face in the mirror.

Right now, they’re working together but there WILL come a time when their interests diverge. There WILL come a time when both outsized egos will KNOW they have the right answer – but their answers won’t match. THAT is when you’ll see the breakdown between them. Set up an office pool. You can do it by the month, week, day, or even hour. When did Trump’s ego clash with Elon’s ego to the point they consciously uncouple?

Yeah, I know. That’s kind of a small comfort, isn’t it? Yeah, it is. I fear it’s what we get for the foreseeable future, small comforts. We have to take them where we can get them, right?

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I STILL say it’s better to remain engaged with your MAGA than to shut them out. For one thing, you KNOW MAGA is getting false information that’s misleading them. THAT doesn’t make them bad people and if you back away, where are they supposed to get better information? BUT…for another thing – and this one might be a bit more difficult to take – if the corporate media is feeding MAGA misinformation on the right, what makes you think the SAME corporate media, the one that benefits so nicely from the ongoing battles between Americans, aren’t feeding misinformation to the left, as well?

Yeah, it’s more subtle. The left is not as vulnerable to outright misstatements. I have long held that the media misdirects the right on facts and they misdirect the left on intentions. The media fools the right on details of events but fools the left on what people might DO about it. And, sometimes, the media deceives the left using “editorial decisions.”

Do you remember Hunter’s laptop? On the left, we, at first, didn’t even know about it. The media really DID suppress info about that laptop so as to not hurt Biden’s chances in the election. I still don’t think the laptop had anything of actual value on it. That’s not the point. The point is, it WAS Hunter’s, the media DID know about it, and they DID suppress the “story” until after the election.

AND, in a very real sense, the media suppressing that story on the left allowed the right to just run with any and all conspiracy theories it wanted. The left never got any chance to push back in the run up to the election so the right was out voting on that, at least in part, and the left didn’t even know it existed. I’m saying, don’t get smug. We don’t have a monopoly on truth.

If we stop talking to our political opposites, we surrender any chance of uncovering the stories intended to manipulate the left. We actually make it easier for the corporate media to foment anger via “editorial decisions.” My actual and honest first choice would be to seek a way to make media – left AND right – more responsible in it’s reporting.

One of the things I noticed early on about conservative media was their insistence that cons don’t risk listening to lefties. I actually heard Rush Limbaugh say to his audience once, “You don’t need to do any thinking. That’s what you have me for.” The right created that wedge as a tool to assist their destruction of the Constitution, and it worked. What makes you think adding to the “divided house” will help in any way? Bear in mind, our actual enemy is the one percent, who understand how tariffs work, not Uncle Conservative, who doesn’t…

Tales That Don’t Track…

by MyBaconPress

Is it true conservatives are ALREADY embracing the Biden economy as Trump’s own? The economic “glory days” they remember from Trump’s first term were the months at the beginning where America was still enjoying the benefits of Obama’s economy. The more Trump messed with it, the worse it got. No, MAGA won’t confess that. It’s just true. THEN, they just ignore the part where it crashed and burned because of his terrible handling of the pandemic. But that part is true, too.

So when Trump started running on how bad the economy is today, I thought enough people would know the difference to understand he was lying. They didn’t. It turns out, young people are still turning toward Trump and even though Trump hasn’t taken the oath of office he’ll ignore, I hear he’s already taking credit for the health of the economy, these days.

There’s a certain element that explains some of the young people’s support: dishonest media. For the last 40+ years, conservatives have been lying to people about what works and what doesn’t and why this and how come not that. Those of us who have completed a higher number of trips around the sun still remember Better America. No, it wasn’t perfect but it was FAR better than this bizarro crap.

So when I hear some talking head pretend there’s such a thing as “Supply Side Economics,” I just shake my head in disgust that people might do that to others. But young people? All they’ve ever heard is that supply side economics IS a thing. That same media works tirelessly to keep them from realizing the longer this supply side crap is in play, the harder their own life has become. There’s a direct relationship. But you have to understand the details to see the connection, and too many people are bored by the details.

I’ve never ONCE argued that the United States was in perfect, or even excellent shape. We’ve had problems since the start. (Largely because of small-minded people.) But we were addressing them, one by one. Maybe we would have made it, given enough time. I thought we were on a good track until Reagan.

But over the course of those 40+ years, young people have never heard correct information about how economies work and instead, have been treated to misinformation and disinformation of the far right. Now, we see the young people out there, supporting the destruction of the nation because they think it’s necessary. But it’s not their fault. They know not what they do…

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The right has been wrong, of course, on the economy. It’s in FAR better shape than they were willing to admit before the “election.” Yes, prices DID go up at an infuriating rate. But people who know understand; that wasn’t “inflation.” It was “greedflation.” Companies were raising prices because they could, and blaming inflation for doing it. But there hasn’t been any systemic inflation in quite some time. It’s all just greed.

Now Trump has offered them a new excuse to start raising prices again: his tariffs. He’s promising some BIG numbers – as high as 20% on things from most foreign countries. He’s threatening even HIGHER tariffs for stuff coming from China. ALL of this will raise prices and make it harder to make ends meet, not easier. AutoZone, Columbia Sportswear, and Stanley Black and Decker have all made clear that if the tariffs go into effect, their prices go up. It will be that way for most imports, which is most products in America, these days.

The excuse will be that the corporate costs went up due to the tariffs so they HAD to pass those costs along. But I’d bet a dollar the prices will go up FAR more than the tariffs will drive because corporate America will have a new excuse to gouge. And gouge they will…

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So, Musk and Neil DeGrasse-Tyson are in a bit of a dispute. Musk thinks he’s going to send humans to Mars. DeGrasse-Tyson thinks he’s not. DeGrasse-Tyson is speaking the truth. His observations are NOT political – they’re economic. Sooner or later, someone is going to have to pay for a project that takes humans to Mars. To do that just for the sake of doing it? When the hell have investors done that? If they don’t expect a financial return for their investment, they don’t invest. It’s pretty simple, really.

Musk says he knows it’s a bad investment so he’s not looking for investors. He’ll just cover the trip, himself. But you’ve STILL got to get people to buy in to the idea enough to actually go, knowing he doesn’t even plan to bring them home. You go. You shout “We MADE it!” You die. There’s probably no optics problem, there. There’s another, more important point, though.

The idea to go to Mars is at least partially driven by the damage we’re doing to Earth. Elon thinks he can just go to Mars and terraform that planet to better match THIS planet. Quick question; why not just fix THIS planet and skip all that other trouble? I mean, if he’s ready to turn Mars into Earth, couldn’t he turn Earth into Earth?

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Every time the gun argument heats up, sooner or later someone insists that guns don’t fire themselves. It can’t happen, we’re told. Apparently, it can. A man insists he had his Sig Sauer P320 holstered as he was coming down the stairs in his house when the gun just…fired. The gun shot the guy in the leg – all by itself. More than 100 other people have come forward to say the same thing; the gun goes off by itself.

Thoughts and prayers, right? Well, no. Not in this case. The guy has been awarded $11 million dollars. (Sig Sauer says they’ll appeal, of course.) His attorney said, and you can’t make this up, “This gun is a danger to gun owners and anyone within the vicinity of this gun.” Apparently, the guy should have bought one of those safe guns that represent no threat to anyone anywhere…

While I’m on the topic of guns? I have a personal theory. Dictators are, generally speaking, not too comfortable with an armed populace. There have already been a couple of less-than-credible-but-still-reported attempts to shoot our incoming dictator. How long do you suppose it’s going to be before a tiny little light goes on in his tiny little brain and he decides it’s too dangerous to him for the masses to have guns? I suspect that conservative sweetheart Donald J. Trump will, sooner or later, be the one who actually comes to “take people’s guns.”

At this point? It’s just a hunch…

Book ’em, Dano. Please? Finally?

by MyBaconPress

WOW! Just wow. I mean, like, wow, wow, WOW! Yet another criminal complaint against Trump has been filed, this one in Ohio. Guess why. No, you have to guess, but I’ll give you a hint. It involves cats and dogs and people eating them…

See it turns out, Ohio has a law that allows a private citizen to swear out a criminal complaint. If someone does, it goes before a judge to check the merits of the case. If it survives that scrutiny, it becomes just another criminal complaint to be handled. And all of that is what happened. A warrant for the arrest of Donald J. Trump and JD Vance has been issued by the State of Ohio.

During his debate against Harris, Trump insisted that Haitians were up in Ohio eating their neighbor’s cats and dogs. They’re not. It’s a made-up story and the woman who made it up has made that completely clear. Still, even after he was told, point-blank, that, no, that’s not a real thing and it’s not happening, he maintained his false story. Authorities in Springfield, Ohio insist no such thing is happening but Trump saw someone blathering on TV (or so he says) and decided to believe the blatherer. He probably wants to make that person Secretary of Ag or something.

The thing is, as we know, when Trump speaks, MAGA acts, and they have been faithful. Haitians in Springfield started getting death threats and enduring other threatening behavior. (MAGA likes to make clear: one does NOT tell the truth about Trump…ever! It’s the law – or soon will be.) That threatening behavior is the basis for the criminal complaint.

So our President-elect, aside from being a felon and adjudicated raper, is now a wanted man in Ohio. Bizarro America is NOT a great place, but it’s going to have it’s elements of fun, you know?

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Well, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued a warrant for the arrest of Benjamin Netanyahu, one of his “defense” ministers, and a leader of Hamas, Mohammed Deif. I’d say the hardest one to serve is going to be on Deif, who was reportedly killed by Israel. But all three are charged with committing war crimes. That seems appropriate, in view of events in Gaza and spreading.

Warrants from the ICC carry little to no weight. Theoretically, those three might be arrested if they travel to certain countries. In practice, that doesn’t really happen. The ICC has no enforcement authority. Israel goes around acting badly because they have a bodyguard, the United States, who will defend them, no questions asked. The ICC certainly isn’t going to get involved in that, and, again, Deif is too dead to be charged.

Besides, with Trump coming in, Israel is about to be unleashed completely and I see the Palestinians being “cleansed” from the river to the sea…

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The left just never seems to get it, you know? We keep thinking sexual assault should be a deal killer for people nominated to some of the highest offices in the land. We expect those charges to derail their confirmations because of, well, decency. Fools. Take a look at the list. It’s long and getting longer. Sexual assault is treated like a peccadillo to be overlooked and/or brushed aside but worse, it seems to be a requirement to working for Trump.

Apparently, Trump is surrounding himself with people who “get him…”

By Thursday afternoon, one of Trump’s fellow perverts – to be clear, I mean Matt Gaetz – had to withdraw his name from consideration for the job of Attorney General. It won’t be that big of a deal for Trump. I’m sure he has a long list of fellow child molesters totally unqualified to do whatever job Trump assigns so he’ll just get one of those. He must have seen SOMEBODY on television that he can choose.

It may be a bigger deal for Gaetz. He stepped down from Congress in order to quash the ethics investigation that was about to do him so much harm. (I base the ‘do him so much harm’ comment on the reality that whenever the idea gets floated of releasing that report anyway, Republicans crap their panties and run. MAGA Mike insists releasing the report would “open a Pandora’s Box.” One has no such concerns when the report says, “Nope, no evidence. All is well.”)

He THOUGHT he was going to be USAG. That hasn’t worked out. But, hey, it’s possible he’s going to be closely associated with an AG office, here, in the very near future…

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In yet another example of how the corruption of the criminal courts is proceeding, Judge Juan Merchan, the judge presiding over Trump’s so-called “hush money criminal trial” that was REALLY an embezzlement trial he lost, is hearing an argument put forth by the defense that the charges against Trump should just be dropped. After all, they argue, being convicted of the crimes one actually committed is VERY inconvenient to one’s future. Failing that, they’re asking the court to, you know, just wait for sentencing until after Trump is finished “Presidentin’,” despite the 40+ felony convictions connected with the case.

Some of us doubt Trump ever intends to leave office under any circumstances. If nothing else, such a ruling by Merchan would give Trump even greater incentive to stay in office.
“We’ll sentence you when you come out.”
“Well, then, I’m not coming out!”

In fairness, I can see how serving the time for your crimes might interfere with the duties of the President. I’m a reasonable guy. I’d move forward with the sentencing. But I’d let him out on a work-release program by day. He could just spend the evenings and weekends in the clink, and come out and harm the nation during the day…

I’ll tell you this: when laws stopped applying across the board, the US was in trouble. These days, the phrase “rule of law” sounds like a punchline of some kind…

A Few Points…

by MyBaconPress

Well, whaddaya know? The corporate media is FINALLY getting around to commenting on Trump’s various proposals. It turns out, they see some…problems. It sure was helpful of them to wait until AFTER the “election” to say so. The latest? You’ll never guess. Despite the fact that Trump promised, over and over, to lower gas prices with “Drill, baby, drill” – a popular chant from the right – it turns out the companies that do those things don’t see any need to drill any more.

It turns out, they LIKE the balance they have between energy available to the customer and the dividends they’re paying to investors. The US is ALREADY the world’s biggest producer of oil and natural gas. (Because nothing says “fighting climate change” better than becoming the world’s biggest producer of oil and natural gas.)

Oh, AND, as it happens, American refineries are not set up to refine the kind of crude we pump from under the North American continent. We can do a little but we can’t do a lot and the oil companies would require a HUGE capital investment in their refineries to do more. Not to put too fine a point on it, that would RAISE prices at the pump. See how that works? When a company has to spend more to get a product to market, they have to charge more for their trouble.

NOW the only remaining question: was Trump lying outright or does he really NOT KNOW the actual US position? I sure am glad the guy without a clue is going to be in charge. It’s… inspiring…

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Truthfully, I’m not sure why Trump is so ready to fight for Matt Gaetz. He is surrounded by a LOT of toady bootlickers ready to pander to his every whim. Any ONE of them would do the job just as badly. Why fight for the guy who assaults underage women and… Oh, right. Never mind…

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Well, MTG is STILL out there, calling for a “national divorce” from the left. She says the left and the right are just too far apart and we can’t get past our irreconcilable differences. At this point? I think I finally agree with something MTG says. I wish the left could leave, too. We’d go back to being a decent country and MAGA could trash the rest…

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Right now, the Dems are working overtime trying to fill judicial vacancies. Right now, cons are working overtime trying to stop them. Dems want responsible people who know and respect the law. Cons want toadies to Trump who will rule as directed. (See Aileen Cannon.) Cons have a few absences in the Senate and, as a result, can’t stop the Dems.

At one point, Sen John Kennedy (R-La) – no, not the good one from history, the guy from Louisiana, said he’s frustrated. THEN he said, “Because a number of President Biden’s nominees, particularly at the courts of appeal, they think they’re qualified to be a federal judge if they’ve seen ‘My Cousin Vinny,’ and I don’t agree with them.”

That’s a bit of a self-own, isn’t it? A quick check of Trump’s staff proposals shows not one, not two, but THREE people Trump has nominated based on the fact that he’s seen them on TV and thinks they must be smart. So OBVIOUSLY the GOP has to start bitching that the DEMS are posting people based on movies. It’s the offset to Trump actually posting people based on who he likes to watch on television.

Kennedy, you won’t be surprised to learn, is simply sucking up to Trump, who wants all of these confirmations to stop. The more decent judges the Dems put in place, the fewer lackeys Trump gets to name – and Trump ONLY likes lackeys…

Bending Over A Dollar…

by MyBaconPress

I was at the VA the other day. The thing I was most struck by on that particular visit was how openly they’re discussing concerns about ongoing funding for medical care for veterans. I hope their concerns are unfounded. I suspect their concerns are well founded.

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I hear Melania is not going to be living at the White House. I guess, again. She didn’t spend much time there during the first Trump maladministration. I ALSO hear (it’s pure rumor, though) that she has a lover who works in the building right next door to Trump Tower. It makes more sense that she would stay with her boyfriend, whom she likes, instead of her husband, whom she does NOT like. She DOES like the money, though. She kind of has the best of both worlds. Why the hell would she move to DC?

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There’s an old phrase, ‘Bend over a dollar to pick up a penny.’ It refers to overlooking serious savings in favor of some nickel-and-dime savings. Do you want to talk about fraud, waste, and abuse in government spending? Do you want to look at government corruption? Don’t look at social services programs. IF you find anything at all, it will amount to a few hundred dollars someone scammed. Look to the Pentagon. Those guys are defrauding, wasting, and abusing government spending in the millions and millions of dollars.

Yes, I know I started this column with a comment about the VA being concerned about their funding. And isn’t that exactly the way? It’s not health care for vets that’s wasting the money. It’s operations of the Pentagon. Active conflicts, sure, but “black programs” nobody – not even Congress – can look at? Are you aware that the Pentagon has never once passed an audit? Not ONCE. That’s not responsible and quality spending. That’s just downright wasteful.

Think of it as being in a small boat. There’s a tiny leak in the bow, and a two inch hole in the stern. Sure, you can spend all your time focused on the seepage in the front, but if you do, you’re going down. Your focus is in the wrong place. That’s how I feel every time I hear about some “welfare queen” who stole even a few thousand dollars. No, it isn’t right and I’m not defending that. I’m just saying that focusing on THAT and not paying any attention to what goes on at the Pentagon is working the seepage and not the two inch hole.

There are too many examples we all know about to highlight here. But I’d bet a dollar nobody will look at or even mention the Pentagon. No one dares…

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I can’t decide if it’s sad or funny, watching the left float various ideas for how to contain Trump and his incoming maladministration. Maybe the ACLU will do something. States have a plan. Maybe (the Republican controlled) Congress won’t confirm so-and-so.

Sorry folks. I don’t mean to be dark but you’d better plan ONLY for how you survive this. Don’t look for someone else to step up and do the right thing. The left has NO power. The right has no shame. They’ll do what Trump tells them to do. Even if they grumble about it, they’ll do it.

Did you see where RFK, jr came out publicly and criticized Trump’s diet? Truthfully, I thought Trump would pull his nomination over the criticism. Instead, we were treated to a photo of RFK, jr munching down on McDonald’s with Trump. RFK, jr said Trump had a terrible diet (this from the guy who brags about eating road kill), and so Trump made RFK, jr eat that same food… and be photographed doing it…

Funny, it didn’t look like McDonald’s so much as crow…

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Well, it looks like Trump really IS going to let Elon Musk lead a task force to make government more efficient – I guess because he did that for X? Since Musk bought X – back when it had a more memorable name – the value of that site has dropped 80%. Did you know that? 80%!

Musk gets a LOT of credit for a LOT of things he never really did. Musk didn’t invent the Tesla. He just took the company over – and pushed out the guys who DID invent the Tesla. (Musk later got a “co-founder” status in court.) Do you believe it was Musk, himself, sitting at a drafting table, working out the engineering details of catching a rocket returning to Earth? No, that was his team. But we HAVE seen Musk at work with X.

Musk took a fully functioning website that was very, very popular (though not very profitable) and managed to KEEP it not profitable while also making is as UNpopular as it had once been popular – all while crashing the value of the company. Yeah, I’m feeling very good about this. After all, what could go wrong?

Ethics? Decency? How Quaint…

by MyBaconPress

Ever since I tuned into the reality that mainstream media is working overtime to smooth the ruffled feathers of the left by telling us all the various and sundry ways the Dems lost, it’s harder to watch than normal. Nobody seems to know, for sure, what Trump will do once he’s back in office but there IS a general consensus that it will try to benefit the wealthy and harm everybody else.

And, who owns that very mainstream media that wants everyone to just simmer down and “understand” how the election went against America? Why, the very wealthy people who own and operate all of that beautiful, misleading media. Wow, what a coincidence.

No matter where you look, the talking heads on the television are trying to convince us that, no, really, Hispanics came out in droves for the guy who insists they’re all criminals and garbage and promised to deport their loved ones and co-workers. Who wouldn’t?

But if I’m being fair, I can see an angle where that makes sense. Incoming immigrants from south of our border really ARE taking jobs from Hispanics, right? Brown people taking brown jobs. Maybe the brown people already here are just trying to protect their own livelihoods. Yeah, maybe.

Now try that with black people who supposedly trust the man in the white pointy hat MORE than the black woman to understand the black community. No, explain the women first. You know, the people in this country whose lives and livelihoods are on the line every day, now, because of Donald Trump. Of COURSE they supported him more than they supported the woman who has the lived experience.

All right, sarcasm aside, there really IS a single thread that might run through most of these people: they don’t believe him. I know, it’s kind of amazing, but they really don’t. Now, from that, I could make the case that they have no idea what Trump will do or what he stands for because they don’t believe the words coming out of his mouth. They voted for him anyway – all while bitching that Kamala didn’t detail her positions enough for them. I guess she should have stuck with mere “concepts of a plan.” THAT, they understand in detail. (Likely because they fill in the details.)

I continue to interact with MAGA in various ways. I hear it a LOT. “Oh, that’s just Trump.” I watched the most recent episode of Real Time with Bill Maher and someone suggested he was just spitballing and the conservative person on the panel eagerly agreed – yes, that IS what he does. I see him tossing out every idea and then letting his listeners pick and choose those they like best. But once he’s in, he’ll only DO those things HE wants to do.

It’s a tough call as to how he’ll deal with the small folk who supported him. On the one hand, he doesn’t need them anymore. He has the power he sought, thanks to them, and now can toss them aside. BUT…he loves the adulation. He might keep pandering to them because they’ll come to his rallies and scream their love for him. More likely, he might keep pandering to them because they keep sending him their money – and the only thing he loves more than money is his own visage in the mirror.

I really wish I had the code. I wish I could tell when Trump was seriously threatening America and the American way of life and when it’s all just a gag to be laughed at and dismissed. Because I lack the key, I believe the words he says. And he scares me. I guess I’ll have to listen to the mainstream media and just…get over it…

Or will I?

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“If you’re in trouble or hurt or need–go to poor people. They’re the only ones that’ll help–the only ones.” – John Steinbeck, ‘The Grapes of Wrath’

See? I’m not alone in my belief that the higher one looks on the economic scale, the LOWER the moral standards of the people one finds there. Over time, I noticed a pattern and then developed a rule-of-thumb I call the ‘Third Generation Rule.’ (Yes, there ARE exceptions. That’s why it’s a rule-of-thumb and not an axiom.) It goes like this:

The first generation of the process is the person who amasses the wealth in the first place. This is often accomplished before the person has kids of their own and that’s the cleanest model for measuring but, occasionally, there are people who get rich later in life. The reason it’s important is this: THAT person usually has worked in their lifetime. They know the value of a dollar and they understand hard work. (Often, it’s someone else’s hard work they’ve exploited but still, they had to get their own hands a bit dirty.)

The first generation tries to instill that appreciation for hard work in their own offspring, the second generation. They try. But because the first generation struggled so mightily, they tend to make life easier for the second generation – while STILL trying to instill the qualities and attributes that came from the struggle. At some point, the second generation realizes they’re being asked to work as little more than a test of some kind. Generally, they vow they won’t do that to THEIR kids. And, usually, they don’t.

The third generation comes up pampered and sheltered and showered with their every desire. NOTHING in life is difficult for them because they have the money to buy themselves out of most situations and they’re surrounded by people who watch out for them. It looks like a pretty sweet life, doing only what you want, when you want. The thing is, it lacks challenge and without challenge there is no character. No, that’s not just MY opinion. Here:

“Not only so, but we[b] also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; 4 perseverance, character; and character, hope.” (Romans 5:3)

“Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened…” Helen Keller

“Nothing is harder to direct than a man in prosperity; nothing more easily managed than one in adversity” Plutarch

“Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents which, in prosperous circumstances, would have lain dormant.” Horace

Many years ago, we started hearing Republicans in Congress suggesting that if we want the best people in Congress, we have to pay competitive wages with the private sector – and Congress started raising their own pay. A LOT. Since that started, the quality of the people in Washington has gone down. A LOT! It’s the Willie Sutton thing.

Yeah, you know the story. A bank robber named Willie Sutton was asked by reporter Mitch Ohnstad why he (Sutton) robbed banks. Sutton replied, “Because that’s where the money is.” He didn’t HAVE to add, “Duh!” It was implied. As salaries went up in Congress, it became a choice opportunity for poorly developed people to get in there and get their beaks wet, as the saying goes. Criminals go to where the money is.

After a time one begins to realize that the people we glorify for their wealth are not the best among us. In fact, generally speaking, they’re usually the worst. Only a person of limited character could do the kinds of things necessary to gain that kind of wealth. At it’s worst, people used to BUY human beings, work them – literally – to death, then just…buy more and put THEM to work. Those are NOT moral people and we would be fools to pretend it wouldn’t still happen if it was possible. Outside of entertainment, one very rarely hears of someone becoming wealthy through completely honest and honorable means.

The Kennedy’s, for example, supposedly got their wealth running moonshine during prohibition – a criminal enterprise. Granddaddy Drumpf got rich through human trafficking. He ran prostitutes – often women who didn’t want to be prostitutes. Granddaddy Bush got rich selling Zyklon B gas to the Nazis during WWII. (His company was convicted and fined.) One sees it over and over and over again. It’s almost stunning in it’s predictability.

But the movement to get as many wealthy people into government as possible has been going on for some time now. Our Congress has gone from solidly middle class to all rich, all the time and the quality of that government has been in steady decline ever since. Consider, our first Congress got paid only eight dollars a day and set up the entire nation. Today, Congress critters start at $174,000 a year and can barely keep the government open. By and large, they’re a sad and useless lot.

This most recent “election” has put the dot at the end of the sentence. We’re about to be ruled by some of the worst, least developed human beings in history. Hey, did you know? That has a name: Kakistocracy – and we’re about to live in one! Kakistocracy is “Government by the least qualified or most unprincipled citizens” or “Government by the worst men.”

I’ll tell you this: It’s going to be a very rough ride for those of us who still believe in ethics and decency…