I live in a small house, just under 1,000 sq ft. I’ve been trying to keep it at about 68 degrees or less. It really irritates me that in the so-called “greatest country on Earth,” I have to wear layers and cover myself in blankets just to try to keep warm but 68 degrees is really the upper limit of what I can afford. You see, I’m paying a little more than $400/mo to try and keep condensation from forming on the counters in the morning. $400.00 bucks. My PG&E bill from the same time last year (different house but similar size) was around $230.00. That’s quite a jump, year over year.

I don’t trust PG&E. Through the years, I’ve come to expect them to “maximize their profits” at my expense. (No, not me, alone.) I didn’t just randomly come to that position. Through the years, PG&E has offered example after example where they were caught doing exactly that so it’s really just a matter of understanding how they have always worked. So, when the gas bills starting ballooning, I just thought it was more of the same, but you know what? Maybe not.

Putin’s illegal invasion of Ukraine has really disrupted the flow of natural gas to Europe. This means Europe has to buy more from the world market, making less available to everyone else. Increased demand creates increased prices – most especially when the drilling companies are making, at best, lackadaisical efforts at increasing supply. The companies blame Biden, pinning the reason on the fact that he cancelled 9,000 unused leases and an as-yet unused pipeline project. (Keyword: unused.) Mostly, *I* blame so-called “Free Market” Capitalism. (There is no such thing as a “Free Market.”) There is, after all, ALWAYS a reason to be suspicious of Capitalists when they’re making money hand over fist like this. But the truth is, it DOES make sense that it’s just a supply and demand issue.

I’ll tell you this: when I open my PG&E bill, it’s ALWAYS “Screw you, PG&E!” Now it’s “Screw you, PG&E – and Putin!”

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Okay, so it’s time for this week’s edition of “Things we could fix and should fix but won’t fix.” Today’s topic? Social Security. This is one of the easiest of fixes but our corrupted, bought-and-paid-for Congress Critters (Thanks Citizen United) can’t do the right thing – they aren’t allowed to by their hyper rich operators. So, instead, they try to offer work-arounds. One of the more popular work-arounds they offer is to raise the eligibility age. They’ve already done this more than once. If they keep doing this, people will have to live to 103 just to apply! That’s a kind of elimination of the program – just setting the eligibility requirements so high nobody CAN make use of it.

But this is one of the easiest fixes to any of the conservative-induced problems we face in our now-submerging nation and a most frustrating part is that we all know the fix. The government has only to eliminate the cap on payment above a certain level. We’re all supposed to try and pay the same dollar amount each year, rich and poor alike. Most of us don’t make the limit but many of the richest people reach the limit with one check and never contribute to the program again for the rest of the year. Simply agreeing that every American should pay the SSAN percentage from 100% of income (like the majority do, today) would, literally solve the problem. Solvency resolved. We won’t, though. Rich people pretend that taking any of the money they steal from workers is stealing their money. (After all, they stole it fair and square!)

I’ll tell you this: normally, I would think, “Oh, cry me a river” about the financial suffering of the hyper wealthy. The truth is, they wouldn’t even notice it’s gone. But these days, thanks to conservatives, the hyper wealthy own and operate Congress and they DO NOT want to pay their fair share of taxes so we’ll get increasing eligibility ages until we reach a “balancing point” where most people don’t live long enough to benefit from their benefits…

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Holy Gods, the death toll in Turkey-Syria earthquake as of this morning has reached 33,000! The thing that shocks me the most about that is they KNOW they live in an earthquake-prone area. They don’t seem to have – or have enforced, anyway – building codes designed to offset potential damages like we do here, in California. Yes, the codes make building more expensive. But it also keeps buildings from crumbling and crushing thousands and thousands of people. Seems like a good trade-off, to me…

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Hard to predict who might win today’s Stupid Bowel. The KC Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles are both great teams. Overall, I think the Eagles look a little better on paper but I suspect the bigger factor is that the Chiefs are still nursing injuries. They’re going to be depleted on Defense and their Quarterback, Patrick Mahomes, appears to have limited use of one of his best weapons: his legs. (Um…would that be two of his best weapons?) That may not be true. KC Head Coach Andy Reid has a long history of allowing his opponents to believe somebody is injured that isn’t or injured worse then they are. Mahomes might come out running wild.

When you get right down to it, though, the truth is, I don’t care who wins. Sure, they’re both great teams and it should be some good football (if you’re into that sort of thing). On the one hand, I would like to see the Eagles win because they knocked the Niners out of contention. Somehow, there’s comfort to the idea that my preferred team lost to the eventual Stupid Brawl champions. On the other hand, I would like to see the Eagles lose for the same reason: they knocked the Niners out of contention. (Petty, eh?) The only thing I really want to pay attention to is this: I expect Andy Reid will have a more effective blocking scheme for Hassan Reddick than any of the other teams have had. If Reid just intends to try to block Reddick with a Tight End, like everyone else, because “that’s the way it’s done in the NFL,” Mahomes will spend FAR too much time on his back to be effective. After that? Well, I’ll watch but I don’t really have a dog in the hunt, as the saying goes.

There’s a risk that such an attitude makes the game a bit…boring so I have a little trick to try to keep it interesting. If you’re having trouble ginning up too much enthusiasm but plan to watch anyway, you might want to try it yourself. It’s simple. I just root for whichever team is behind. Maybe my “team of the moment” can bring it back, maybe they can’t, but it gives me a reason to watch. It CAN make the game more exciting. But, if they don’t pull it off, well, ces’t la vie.

So…good luck to both teams. My earnest prayer is that every player who walks onto the field walks off again healthy and safe.

The Balloon Backfire…
OMG that freaking balloon! Cons lost their collective little minds over the thing and Biden was in a no-win situation with them. (Their favorite kind.) We saw it over Alaska. Was it a weather balloon blown off course, as the Chinese claimed? Was it a spy balloon? No one knew. Biden elected to keep an eye on the thing and shoot it down over water so we might have a chance to recover some of it and find out for ourselves what the heck it was doing. That gave the cons an opening to criticize him. “WHY NOT SHOOT IT DOWN NOW, NOW, NOW, RIGHT NOW?”, they demanded.

Of course, if he had ordered it shot down immediately, everyone would have had to cross their fingers hoping that none of it hit something or someone and the payload would have vaporized upon impact eliminating any chance of discovering it’s true purpose. (It was 7 to 11 miles up.) Then the cons would have shouted that he should have waited until it was over water. He was going to lose – in their minds – either way. How predictably boring.

Then we all found out the Chinese flew their weather/spy balloon over the US THREE times during Former Guy’s maladministration. Former guy did what he did about everything that didn’t affect him personally: nothing. I haven’t heard a word from the cons about that. I guess letting the Chinese have the information they wanted was the answer the MAGA cons preferred…

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The Durham Report Backfire…
Okay, you knew it was coming, right? The very moment you started hearing the cons whining about the weaponization of the DOJ you just KNEW there was going to be evidence of the cons weaponizing the DOJ. Now the Durham Report is coming out and what it shows, mostly, is – and you might want to sit down for this – that was really Former Guy who weaponized the DOJ for his own evil intent.

After his 2016 campaign was caught communicating with Russians – the kind of Russians Team America feels it’s important to monitor – an investigation was launched into why. Some of his people (low level, obviously) were even convicted. That apparently irritated Former Guy. The investigation, not the convictions. He doesn’t really care about those. Hell, he’s used to it. It seems like someone from his inner circle gets convicted nearly every day. But he DID launch an investigation of his own. The idea, see, was to investigate the investigators and prove they were evil little minions out to get him.

So, lackey Bill Barr appointed an ex-US Attorney General named John Durham to look into it. Oh, man, the right went nuts. The cons were sure they were about to uncover corruption on a never before seen scale. “You just wait until the Durham Report comes out!,” they’d scream, “Then we’ll ALL know!” It became a common refrain. The investigation went on for years. Now it’s winding down and you’ll never guess what Durham found. Oh, you got it. Nothing, that’s right. It turns out, it was Former Guy and Barr weaponizing the DOJ, not the other way around.

Based on available evidence, Barr and Durham worked FAR too closely together and made many public statements about the investigation, always leaving the impression that they were THIS CLOSE to proving the corrupt “deep state.” The current accusations against them suggest they were timing “reports” for political purposes to try to spruce up Former Guy’s image or tarnish the images of his opponents. Durham is accused of using unethical techniques to smear political opposition. More than one of his investigators quit because of it. Well, at least we can say the cons were finally right about something: Now that Durham is coming out, we DO know the reality – and once again, it shoots the cons, not the DOJ, in the feet…

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The Shout-at-the-President Backfire…
I sure liked the way old Sleepy Joe conned the cons at the State of the Union address. By now, we all know the cons will shout at the President during his speeches like petulant teenagers first chance they get. He casually mentioned that some Republicans, not a majority, not even a large number but some Republicans want to sunset Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Republicans, in a now standard display of their lack of decorum, started screaming their damn fool heads off. “NO!” and “No way!” over and over. Marjorie Taylor Greene even got to call the President of the United States a liar. (They love that and she sends out fundraising letters immediately. ‘I called the DemocRAT President a liar. Will you donate to my campaign?’)

After Biden let them scream, yell, deny, and insist he’s misrepresenting for a little while, Biden smiled and said, Well, then, we all agree, no cuts to Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid. Good. So now, they’re ALL on record saying that, no matter what, they won’t even try to touch any of those programs. That won’t stop them, though. The cons HATE those programs for the same reason they HATE the Postal Service. All of them prove, daily, that government CAN do things right and that really violates their dearly held pretension that government can never do anything right. Hell, the postal service did things so well the cons had to install a saboteur, Louis DeJoy to try and bring it down. Slowly but surely, he’s doing it, too. (Truthfully, I don’t know why the man still has that job…) But I digress.

Just because Biden snookered the cons into swearing loudly and in public they wouldn’t attack those programs doesn’t mean they won’t attack those programs. They have no shame so there’s nothing to stop them from back-peddling. Still, it was fun to watch. It turns out, it was just a couple of cons making that proposal. He just gave them the rope and watched them hang themselves.

Thanks to the cons, the country, as a whole, seems to be declining steadily and rapidly but the political machines still work just fine. The cons had their pushback out pretty quickly, showing a much younger Biden on the floor of Congress giving a speech about trying to cut Social Security four times. That did quiet the left a bit but, of course, it wasn’t the same. Based on their long-standing positions (and actions) cons want to end those programs. Biden was talking about suspending increases for a short time and raising the eligibility age. Delaying payments would have saved some money, a de-facto “cut.” Don’t try to explain nuance to cons, though. They have enough trouble just grasping reality, they’re never going to grasp nuance…

So, is it or isn’t it? At this point, I guess that should be was it or wasn’t it? I’m talking about that Chinese balloon that floated across the country doing…whatever it was it was doing. If you ask the Chinese, they’ll tell you it was a weather balloon measuring wind patterns. The US says it was likely a spy balloon, taking a look to see what’s what. Once it was safe to do so, the US shot the thing down and is now working to gain the equipment the thing was carrying. They’ll know, soon, what it was looking at and why.

Meanwhile, Former Guy’s namesake – in an effort to prove the mental shortcomings of the patriarch seem to have been inherited – took a shot at blaming Biden for some perceived failure by suggesting that the good people of Montana could “do their thing.” He wrote, for everyone to see, “If Joe Biden and his administration are too weak to do the obvious and shoot down an enemy surveillance balloon perhaps we just let the good people of Montana do their thing… I imagine they have the capability and resolve to do it all themselves.”

This balloon was flying as high as airliners fly. What the hell kind of weaponry does Dumbass Jr think they have in Montana? If the shooters miss, as they surely will, where do the rounds fall? If they hit it, virtually impossible, are there dangers to dropping an unknown piece of equipment from 7 to 11 miles up?

I’ll tell you this: It’s no surprise a con wants to impugn Biden. It’s what they do. But I recommend not making yourself look the bigger fool by just suggesting stupid, stupid stuff just to try to make a political opponent look bad. That tends to boomerang…

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That horrifying human being, Marjorie Taylor-Greene is in the news again this morning. She’s out whining that her salary is too low. How’s THAT for disconnected? MTG makes – officially – $174,000/yr. Worse, it seems those clowns work only about half the year to begin with. Even worse? Congress is the only place in this once-great nation where insider trading is officially allowed. They don’t call it that, but as the Bard pointed out, what’s in a name? If a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, a fresh pile of poop, by any other name would still stink. And, in my opinion, Congress critters allowing themselves to profit from their insider information stinks…

Don’t get me wrong. I do actually believe MTG thinks she’s not making enough money. Congress critters have the freedom to set their own pay rates. They USED to vote on annual increases but that took on some tough “optics” as time went on so they just passed an annual increase for themselves. In my personally revised US Constitution, I addressed that problem. I tie the salary of Congress critters to the median annual income of the American people. That way, if Congress critters want more money, they have to improve the lot of the American people. When the fortunes of the masses decrease, so does the pay of the “representatives.”

I’ll tell you this: I get tired of hearing people who make so much whine about how little they make or how tough it is trying to get by on “only $174,000 a year – especially when this same crowd will tell other people they should be able to get by on $15/hr ($31,200/yr). Let’s all be sure to offer MTG the “one finger salute” every chance we get…

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There are things in this once-great nation that we all suffer from that have fixes – but people won’t fix them. I say “people” and not just “Congress” because no one wants them changed despite the damage they do. I classify these as things people could fix, should fix, but won’t fix. First up? Homelessness.

Homelessness is not an accident. It’s a manufactured crisis affecting more Americans every day. But no one wants the “fix” because everyone profits from the scam all the way down the line – except the people who can’t keep up anymore. They just suffer. They become the great unwashed and get shuffled from campsite to campsite. Modern day Hoovervilles. It takes too much space to cover over the course of a blurb in a blog properly and in detail. It would take a book to explain and support the position and this ain’t a book so, instead, you get the thumbnail.

Around the beginning of the 21st century, Wall Street had introduced a new investment tool, the mortgage derivative. It was presented as “solving” the problem of loan defaults. Instead, it destabilized the entire mortgage banking industry through fraud. The result was the economic crash of 2008. When the crash came, people started losing the houses they had borrowed too much to buy. Some because they couldn’t keep up with the payments, some through “strategic walkaways.” The banks ended up owning a LOT of houses.

The banks SHOULD have fixed up the houses and put them back on the market, but they didn’t. The houses were now “valued” too high and putting all of them back on the market at once would have, certainly, caused the house prices to fall back to where they should have been. This would have increased strategic walkaways as people found themselves permanently under water. So, the government found a way to protect the bankers AND the artificially increased equity in owned homes. Unfortunately, because the country was already suffering the economic turmoil of Wall Street greed, that meant the masses were no longer in a position to buy the overpriced houses. So, in 2011, the government changed a rule and allowed “pooled money investors” to buy single family homes. Prior to that, they had been limited to strip malls, office complexes, and apartment buildings.

The pooled money investors started buying and haven’t stopped – and they aren’t going to. The fact that they ARE “pooled money” means they have no competition when it comes to bidding on housing. The average borrower simply can not keep up. The tragic phenomenon is summed up in every commercial for companies that will buy any house, cash, at any time, in any condition, with no inspections, no repairs, and you get to pick your escrow length – anything from days to a month. There’s simply no way an average borrower can compete.

The fix? Require the pooled money investors to divest from single family housing and give them a short window to sell off their existing inventory. Yes, the flood of houses would cause housing prices to drop fast and far. That’s the goal. It would “right-price” housing again. But it would also cost homeowners their artificially inflated equity. They don’t want that. Property tax roles would decline along with everything else. Governments don’t want that. Buying and selling properties would become less lucrative. Real estate agents and banks don’t want that. I understand all of their positions. But with everybody protecting their own, private position, they’re all, collectively, bringing America to her knees.

In short, there’s a direct link between the homelessness problem in America today and our “free market” driven greed. Remember that the next time you see a letter to the editor complaining about homeless encampments or the news stories about the encampments being rousted and relocated. Homeless encampments are direct and frustrating evidence of the failure of so-called “free market” Capitalism, the direct product of deregulation. We could do something about it. We should do something about it. But we won’t do anything about it.

Yes, I know, that’s only one aspect of the three-pronged problem of homelessness: poverty, drug (including alcohol) abuse, and mental illness. But fixing the last two requires the same solution: involuntary institutionalization and treatment – and we can’t do that because rich people don’t want to pay their fair share of taxes so we lack the resources – which is stupid. America really IS the richest nation on Earth. It’s just that all the wealth is concentrated in, like, 15 people’s hands…

I’ll tell you this: as their numbers swell, I expect the homeless will get fed up with the unfairness of the whole thing, becoming angrier and angrier. How do YOU think this is going to end? But, hey, for a short, wonderful while, there, some had amazing equity…

This morning, the Guardian has two stories about Former Guy that seem to go together, somehow. The first is about his latest Presidential bid, a bid, by the way, that is gaining steam despite all the talk from the right about moving on from the clown show. The second is about a book detailing some of the infighting regarding one of the many criminal investigations aimed at Former or his company.

Truth be told, I’m not sure what’s taking so long with these prosecutions. The evidence of his crimes seems overwhelming – unless you’re a con, of course. Then they have no idea what you’re talking about. But the people who understand things have already seen or heard much of the evidence against the guy. For example, if a recording existed of me calling the Secretary of State for Georgia and trying to strong-arm him into “finding” 11,781 more votes, I have high confidence the trial would, by now, be LONG behind me and I’d be sitting in jail serving my sentence. I still don’t think he’s going to jail, though I believe he should. But they should move forward with the prosecution.

I think the prosecutors are concerned he’s going to gin up his base to protest any prosecution. I don’t think that should be an impediment. Yeah, sure, the MAGA cons are going to scream. Hell, they ALWAYS scream. I know, January 6th demonstrated that – delusional or not – they can be an actual threat to safety. It has also shown that the law is ready to deal with the low-level perpetrators. Sadly, it’s also showing that the law is unable to deal with the high-level perpetrators, aka, the ringleaders. I STILL say this was a better country under the rule of law.

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File this under actions speak louder than words: Florida is working as hard as it can to limit access to voting. The state’s Governor, Rhonda Santis…no, that’s a drag queen name…he’s Ron DeSantis, has made voting by mail harder First, hundreds of thousands of people who had requested absentee ballots had their requests summarily cancelled. They’ll have to re-register and some percentage of them won’t know they were cancelled in time to get it done. He has also limited access to drop-off points. According to the article I read, “Republicans enacted the measure even though Florida regularly earns praise for having well-run elections and saw no major problems with voting in 2020. Voting by mail is popular in the state – about a third of voters used it in the 2022 general election.”

In short, DeSantis has “fixed” a problem that doesn’t exist. No, that’s not right. There IS a problem: most people won’t vote Republican these days because the party has collectively lost it’s mind. The ONLY way for Republicans to have a chance in any election is to limit the number of people who vote. THAT’S the “problem” DeSantis is addressing. Sure, they could try reasonable policies. That might work, too. But they’re not going to do that. They’ve got a “culture war” to fight and this is the only way they can think of to fight it.

I’ll tell you this: limiting access to voting is unamerican and anti-democratic (and definitely anti-Democratic…)

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Oh, those poor Niners. Listen, I don’t care which team you are or which team you’re playing, no team can win an NFL game without a Quarterback. The game was quite disappointing, not so much because my preferred team “lost” – though there was that, too – but because they never really got a chance to play the game. The only thing I saw that might be called a mistake was Shanahan’s apparent failure to scheme against Haason Reddick. He’s an outside linebacker. He plays for the Eagles. He’s a freaking machine, far and away, one of the best players to ever play the position. Maybe THE best, but he’ll have to keep it up for awhile to earn that title.

The standard blocking scheme against a guy like that is exactly what Shanahan pointed to after the game: you have a Tight End block him – or try to. The problem is, any game film Shanahan watched (and I’d guess he watched a LOT) shows that the standard scheme just doesn’t work with that guy. Now, nobody found an answer for Reddick all season long so it’s not really fair to point out that Shanahan didn’t, either. But I never saw a double-team on him. I would have liked to see someone stay in the backfield with the Quarterback specifically to help block that guy. The trade-off is one less option at receiver but my position is that more receivers downfield are useless if the QB is on his back all day – or worse, as Niner fans discovered. (I expect Andy Reid, Kansas City’s Head Coach, will have a double team scheme for Reddick in the Stupid Bowl.) (If I use the real name of the game, the NFL expects payment…)

I also think Shanahan should have thrown the challenge flag on that fourth down not-a-catch. Kyle’s after game comment is true and fair: he didn’t seen the angle that proved it was not a catch until it was too late. Even the fact that there was a Niner player right there who immediately turned to his coach and told him it wasn’t a catch is not really enough. Players do that all the time. If a coach listened to every player to made a claim about a play, he’d likely be out of challenges and timeouts halfway through the first quarter. But in addition to his own player telling him it wasn’t a catch, the supposed catcher, DeVonta Smith, immediately told his teammates to snap the ball fast – precluding a review. Those two bits together should have been a sign. Smith knew he hadn’t caught the ball. Shanahan later said he didn’t want to give up the timeout and I get that. You don’t want to let the other team steal a timeout from you. But, instead, they stole a Touchdown. And we ALL know, now, that the challenge would have been successful and the team would NOT have lost a timeout.

But ALL of that is unfair. Shanahan’s logic was sound, though mistaken. There’s ALWAYS this fact: Kyle Shanahan was making decisions, real time, with less information than I had. I had several days to come to my conclusions. He had to do it right now, in the moment. I’d bet that if it ever comes up again, he’ll throw the flag.

Also, I think complaining about how the NFC Championship game played out is typical Niner-fan whining. Under any circumstance, a team relying on their third string QB should never even have BEEN in that game. When the starter went down for the season, it could have been a disaster. It was only a curious string of events that caused them to still have access to last year’s starter to come in and take over. When HE went down for the season, the Niners were forced to use their third stringer – who would have been the second stringer except for the previously mentioned curious string of events.

When they brought in their third stringer, I was pretty sure their season was over. It should have been. In just about any other situation, it would have been. Apparently, NOBODY expected to discover that, in fact, Brock Purdy is the best Quarterback on the roster. (That’s a different question: How come nobody knew what they had?) So we got more from our boys in crimson and gold than we had a right to. After Purdy went down, Josh Johnson came in and did the best he could for as long as he could but the Niners were now, decidedly, in the no-Quarterback situation. When Johnson went down and Purdy was sent back in – limited to hand-offs – the game was over. Everybody just had to wait out the clock and it was ugly and hard to watch.

But, as I indicated, we got a far better season from them than we had a right to expect and, if not for a series of unfortunate events, might well be looking at the Big Game. Sure, other teams are going to poach our coaches and players but I still trust the leadership team of Kyle Shanahan and John Lynch to make the best choices going forward, and quibbling that the Niners didn’t have one more miracle in their pockets is a kind of luxury that goes with such a successful team.

I’m looking forward to next season…

I know people who go to concerts performed by…um…yesterday’s bands and want to hear only the songs they first heard 40 or 50 years ago. I know musicians that play the music that was popular when they learned to play and rarely, if ever, play anything that came out after, say, 1979. So, I “get” the phenomenon of people preferring to hear what they heard before. If you’re a con, that means going to a Former Guy rally and listening to his paranoid rants about how everyone is out to get him and everyone else is out to get any con they can. He just had a rally and, apparently, he “played” all of his hits: ‘Mexicans are bad people,’ ‘The Commies Are Coming,’ and his hit, ‘Nobody Can Negotiate But Me.’

For me, I like listening to the oldies. There’s some good stuff there. But I think new stuff is good, too. Former Guy played to a room of about 500 but insisted there were “thousands” just outside the doors. You know, where no one could see them. It’s hard to believe people still come out for his shtick. He gave tribute to his most enduring hit: “Waaa, I won!” and his fans ate it up.

The thing is, I see people counting him out in the media nearly every day but I also remember people counting him out, over and over, during the run-up to the 2016 election. Then he won. I still think the base for Former Guy is shrinking but I also think that if he can manage to wrangle the nomination again, they’ll just swallow what little pride they may have left and vote for him anyway. (In their tiny little minds, it’s “anyone but Biden.”) I still remember January 6th, 2021.

If the cons are stupid enough to put him back into the Oval Office – and they are – he won’t leave. Remember how close he came to not leaving the last time? One of the tales cons tell is that he stole the classified documents he stole “accidentally” because there was so little time for him to prepare to move out of the White House. Actually, he had nearly three months. He just squandered that time trying to prove reality was false and fake was real. Hell, he’s still trying to prove it.

By now, there are only two possibilities: one, he truly believes he won. That makes him delusional and dangerous. Two, he knows darn good and well he didn’t win but sticks to his fraudulent story anyway. That makes him calculating and dangerous. Either way, he’s dangerous. I don’t know why nobody (with the power to do so) anywhere in this once-great nation has invoked the 14th Amendment prohibition against him ever holding public office again. The fact that we can’t or won’t protect ourselves from a known, wanna-be dictator is stunning to the mind.

I’ve read many articles about all the legal troubles he faces. I see people all around him going to jail, one after the other. I see Former slithering through every instance seemingly with ease. His “organization” was recently found guilty of tax fraud. The company was fined $1.8 million dollars. But Former can pick that up from his supporters in a day. The struggling work-a-day lackeys will pay the business genius’s fines happily – even when it means eating cat food for the rest of the month. (They really are not deep thinkers…)

This country – hell, the entire world – watched his orchestrated coup attempt unfold on January 6th. Anybody but a MAGA loyalist knows about the crimes committed. The January 6th commission laid them bare – on television. The fact that nobody seems able to do anything about it is rather embarrassing – and super frustrating – to sane Americans. Cons immediately started denying the events of January 6th. It’s gotten so bad, they now insist there’s not even such a thing as a ‘January 6th’ on a calendar. We jump straight from January 5th to January 7th. They all know it. January 6th is just a liberal plot.

I think the MAGA cons are terrified, delusional little people – but they’re dangerous. The very fact that they have so successfully rejected facts and verifiable information while so readily embracing delusions makes them impossible to reason with. Just yesterday, I wrote about the frothing cops who murdered Tyre Nichols. He tried reason. I wrote that those cops were locked in a pack mentality. At the risk of violating Godwin’s Law, I see in the MAGA cons the same froth for their guy as the brown shirts of 1930’s Germany. The brown shirts were locked-in, too. Wrong about every detail, ready to murder for their wrongheadedness. Pack mentality. Reason had no place for them, either. Now the MAGA cons are doing the same and, make no mistake, they’re being groomed to become the same frothing pack that rears it’s ugly head from time to time. We saw it once on January 6th – and that was just the Overture. There’s plenty more crazy to behold. All they need is their dear leader to unleash them. What makes you think he won’t?

I’ll tell you this: If we let this crazy sumbitch anywhere near the levers of power ever again, we get what we deserve.

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Holy Gods. Speaking of crazy cons, this David DePape guy is a classic. He’s the guy who attacked Paul Pelosi with a hammer – right in front of the cops. (Look, believing in the “evil” of Nancy Pelosi is bad enough. Going to her house is over the top. Attacking her husband with a hammer is outrageous. But doing it right in front of the cops? On a police body-cam? Well, that’s just downright stupid…)

DePape is in jail now and, I suspect, will be for a long time to come. On the day the body-cam footage was released, he called in to KTVU, a local television station. He said he had an important message for America. “You’re welcome!” Then he apologized and said that what he did was “really bad.” But as he rambled on, it became clear that the “really bad” part was that he hadn’t been more prepared. In his pea-brain, his error was in not getting “more of them.” His nearly-coherent rant touched on several of the preferred MAGA con talking points, not one of which is true. He actually believes himself an effing patriot! If I may quote Bugs Bunny, “What a maroon…”

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I’ve got to say, I’m so excited about today’s Niners @ Eagles match-up I can barely contain myself. I can only imagine how excited the players, themselves, must be. (Makes sense. They’re doing all the work.) It promises to be one of the best football games ever. These two teams are very well matched. As nearly as I can tell, there’s only one area where there’s any separation between them. The Niners have a great running game. The Eagles have an average run defense. Hell, even the experts can’t really pick a winner. The Eagles are a 2.5 point favorite. The thing is, teams usually get a three point boost for playing at home. If the Eagles got a three point boost but the line is only 2.5 points, the Niners appear to be a .5 point favorite. That’s not a lot.

There’s an old saying in football: “Offense sells tickets but defense wins championships.” The Niners have the number one defense in the league. But guess who’s got the number two defense? Yep, the Eagles. The Eagles have a pro-bowl level Quarterback and the Niners have a rookie. That should – in most cases absolutely would – guarantee an Eagles advantage. (I’m sure it’s one of the things folks are focused on in Philly.) But the rookie in this case is Brock Purdy. Yeah, he’s a rookie. But he’s also already knocking down some of Joe Montana’s early records. So far, he’s played brilliantly. I’d bet Purdy is the de facto starter going forward…

Listen, I’ve been a football fan since Jesus wore short pants. Anything can happen in these games. Sometimes, what pencils out as a great game falls flat for some reason. It could happen, here, too, and if it does, so be it. But I’m expecting a great game. I wouldn’t bet on it, though. It’s just too close in too many ways to pick a winner I’d put my hard-earned money on. But I’m pulling for the Niners…

I’m also pulling for the Bengals over the Chiefs. I’d like to see a Stupor Bowl rematch between the Niners and Bengals.

Whatever happens, it’s been a great season. It’s been lots of fun watching these boys play. I hope every player on all four teams come away healthy and I hope I get to watch my Niners play two more games this season, today and in Arizona in two weeks…

The answer is yes. I AM ready for some football…

Well, well, four of the Oath Keepers have been convicted of seditious conspiracy for their part in trump’s January 6th coup attempt the cons pretend didn’t happen. (We’re sure paying a lot to keep these morons in prison for something that cons insist never happened…) This is after their useless leader, Stewart Rhodes, was convicted of the same thing a few weeks ago. As a “defense,” they kept whining that the courts were prosecuting them and not their “inspiration,” the 45th so-called “President.”

Listen, they have a point. The former guy should be prosecuted. But that doesn’t mean the Oath Keepers shouldn’t be prosecuted. It means former guy should be prosecuted along with them. He still might be, but I’m not holding my breath. This country, despite her rhetoric, does not operate on the rule of law for all any more, if it ever did. There’s one set of rules for rich and/or well connected people, another, rougher set of rules for the rest of us. So far, several of the attackers have tried to defend themselves by blaming the former guy. “We just did what he told us to do.” Uh-huh. Guess what? You’re responsible for your actions. Someone tells you to do something illegal. You do it. YOU are guilty. Period.

I’ll tell you this: I hear these guys face up to twenty years. I hope they have to do every day of it…

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I really don’t know what the hell is wrong with people. Five cops beat a man to death. The dead man is black, of course. The thing is, so are all five of the cops. Hard to call it a racist thing when everybody involved is the same race. The victim is a man named Tyre Nichols. The cops are all fired, now, and charged with second degree murder, aggravated assault, aggravated kidnapping, official misconduct, and official oppression. Body camera footage of the murder has been released. It’s a tough watch.

From the moment these asshole cops first confront Mr. Nichols, they’re shouting at him complete with the kind of expletives we expect from the bad guys in movies when they’re doing their crimes. From the way the cops are acting, I would have guessed Mr. Nichols was suspected of killing a cop, or a baby, or some other, particularly heinous crime. They force him to the ground, then keep telling him to get on the ground. He tells them straight up he’s not resisting. They threaten to tase him anyway and continue to assault him. (That’s not even the tough part.) At some point, Mr Nichols must have begun to feel like these guys were out to hurt him. He got scared – of the cops. He managed to get up and run. The killer cops give chase. As Nichols runs away, another cops says, “I hope they stomp his ass!” He says it twice. He gets his wish, too.

The cops catch up to him. In his last, few moments, he starts calling to his mother. Apparently, his house was only about 80 yards away. At no time did Mr. Nichols fight back or appear to resist. In fact, he tells the cops, over and over, that he’s complying. He DOES ask why they’re after him. He honestly doesn’t understand what’s happening or why, since he hasn’t done anything wrong. I’m sure the cons will “defend” the cops by pointing to the fact that Nichols got up and ran but it wasn’t defiance. By that time, I’m sure it was terror. He was being physically abused by the cops and had no idea why. But if it’s the cops doing the beating, who does one call for help?

Fortunately for my psyche, the public video goes dark as the worst of the beatings ensue and the version I saw resorts to descriptions. The video doesn’t resume until an ambulance is on scene to take him to the hospital. But, apparently, nobody even called for help for another 20 minutes after the beating. Mr. Nichols died of his injuries three days later.

The thing I find most chilling about the video is that the victim was trying to protect himself by pointing out to the cops that he was complying. He pointed out that they were “doing a lot,” meaning they were being FAR more aggressive than they needed to be. They told him to get on the ground as they pushed him to the ground, then told him to get on the ground again. He answered that he was on the ground. In short, he tried to reason with them. But those cops?

Those cops were in full-on pack mentality. I suspect that, in the moment, they never even heard the words that we coming out of Mr. Nichols’ mouth. They didn’t care that he complied. They didn’t care that he hadn’t done anything. They were not fully present, anymore. Their focus was on bringing down their prey. Mr. Nichols never even knew what he was being murdered for, that is, what the cops THINK he may have done. (The Memphis police said the initial stop was for reckless driving, clearly a death penalty offense…)

From time to time, human beings can be reduced to their most basic, animal instincts and pack mentality is one of them. These cops didn’t like being defied – even though they weren’t defied. Their good old boys club created the pack and the moment inflamed it. History is replete with other examples of such brutal pack mentality. But the history isn’t the part I find most chilling.

I’ll tell you this: These days, you can hear cons out there making the case that this is the exact kind of violence this country needs to put it back on “the right track.” The cons are not the deepest thinkers in the crowd. It isn’t their idea. They’re being led to it. The animal portion of the human animal instinct is being nurtured. The con media bubble is creating the pack and at some point, they might well be released by the conservative bubble to go forth and destroy. (Think January 6th.) When they are released, no amount of reason, no amount of calm, no fact or aspect will be relevant or able to stop them. The pack will just…attack…

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There’s a book out called ‘Myth America: Historians Take on the Biggest Legends and Lies About Our Past.’ Purportedly, it supposes to address all the conservative stories out there and debunk them, once and for all. I plan to read it, though I already know the cons lie about everything, all the time. They’ve built up a mythos that gives them permission to do all the horrible things they do that goes all the way back to the landings on Plymouth Rock and how the white settlers got to start off with a “blank slate” because there was nobody here. (The First Nations would beg to differ, having met the settlers onshore as they clambered out of their boats.)

The thing is, I like history so I read a lot of history and I’m very much looking forward to this book, despite the fact that I might very well know all of the information contained inside. I’m sure there will be details and events with which I’m not familiar. I don’t mean to paint myself as some kind of walking History Oracle. That’s why I keep reading. I just keep learning. Still, I don’t expect any grand surprises – to me. I expect that many on the left who pick up this book will nod in agreement. “Yeah, I remember learning that.” “Oh, yeah, I knew that, too.” It will be helpful and beneficial. Sadly, not to the cons who need it most.

Cons don’t read anything longer than street signs. I mean, I guess they can, they just don’t. Worse, even if a con DID pick up a copy and start thumbing through, they would set it aside again at near light speed. The last thing in the world a con wants is to be exposed to facts. Sad…

***

Since the topic of the moment, here, is books, I’m currently reading one called ‘Walking the Nile’ by a guy named Levison Wood. Truth be told, I was not too excited to pick it up. What, after all, could it be about?
Page one: “I put my right foot forward, then shifted my weight over it. Then I put forth my left foot and, again, shifted my weight forward. Then, in an unexpected development, I moved my right foot forward and shifted my weight again.”
Page 322: “Having left my right foot behind me on the last step, I once again brought it forth and shifted my weight to it, taking yet another step – a step into the Mediterranean Sea. What a satisfying expedition.”

Fortunately, it is MUCH better than that. I borrowed the book from a friend who had recommended it. (Thanks, Joe!) As he handed it over, he told me, “I learned that Africa is a seriously messed up place!” The book really is about a guy attempting to walk along the Nile River from one of it’s headwaters to the Mediterranean Sea but there’s absolutely NO “left foot, right foot.” Instead, he explores the people and places he meets along the way and covers much history of the continent where the river passes. It’s a fascinating book and I heartily recommend it if you’re looking for something to read but I came away with the same feeling as my friend. Africa is a seriously messed up place…

There’s a story in this morning’s Guardian saying Biden’s Chief of Staff, Ron Klain, is stepping down from his position. It was placed right next to a story about how still MORE classified documents have been uncovered in Biden’s possession. Well, no, that’s not right. The way these files keep being found, it seems more like he reads something, then just tosses it aside and it ends up in a pile of jetsam somewhere in some room, office, or garage. I suspect there’s an attempt to link Biden’s mishandled files with some failing on Klain’s part so Klain falls on his sword. I don’t think it’s going to work, though.

This piece, that I’m writing right now is a primary difference between left and right in this country. If I were a Republican, I’d be defending Biden’s actions no matter what, despite the fact that mishandling classified documents is an indefensible act. There are a LOT of excuses we could toss out. We could take a page from the Republican playbook and simply pretend a) it never happened or, b) Biden declassified them with his mind or even c) the files all belonged to Biden and some functionary simply failed to cross out the classified markings. But the left doesn’t do that. We don’t pick and choose right and wrong based on the person in question’s political affiliations. We start off at “mishandling classified documents is bad” and go from there. It remains true regardless of the person doing the mishandling.

Truth be told, though, I would like to know the level of classification of those files. Are they confidential or Top Secret? Are they assessments of nuclear capability or personality assessments of world leaders? In practice, it makes very little difference. Classified is classified. Mishandled is mishandled. But I worry less if the files are confidential than if they’re Top Secret or higher.

To be clear, you can put me in the crowd that thinks that, overall, Biden hasn’t done a bad job as the President. But I DO worry about his age. It’s not an “ageist” thing. I don’t worry about the number, alone. My concern is not his age but rather, HIS age and the way the years are expressing themselves in him – and I really would prefer he not run again. I think the fact that he can’t keep track of classified materials is one good example of the way he seems to be experiencing some…set-backs of age.

I was treated to an opinion from conservative media that pretended the files were planted – by the DemocRATS! (Conservative dogma DEMANDS one capitalize the last four letters…) Because the Dems don’t want Biden to run again, they set him up to look bad. Okay, well, if we’re going with paranoid conspiracy theories, here, I like mine better: Donnie the Dumbass had someone plant some of the files Donnie stole in order to do exactly what it’s doing – giving the cons an out. But for those of us who continue to dwell in the real world, it’s most likely Biden just mislaid them – and then forgot about them entirely.

I hope he doesn’t run again. Yes, it leaves the Democrats with a problem. Which aging, corporate, oldster with yesterday’s solutions to tomorrow’s problems do they run in his place? For reasons I can’t understand, the Dems simply refuse to go younger, with fresh blood and fresher ideas. But now is the time. The cons are in disarray. At this point, it looks like they’re going to run the moronic extremist trump again or, perhaps the slightly less (but still) moronic extremist Ron DeSantis. With those as the picks from the right, the left has a bit of wiggle room.

I’ll tell you this: Every day, more and more Americans – true Americans – are catching on to the b.s. that is the conservative position and abandoning it. The extremist far right is finally losing ground but it’s going to take a bit of time for them to purge the problems from the party and in the meantime, the left can try out some new, younger talent…

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I’ll tell you this: I’m pretty excited about today’s playoff game between the Cowboys and the Forty-Niners. The Niners have enjoyed a bit of a dream season. They lost not one but TWO Quarterbacks making the third stringer the starter and dashing the hopes of the faithful – until it turned out that the third stringer is a bit of a ringer and plays like…well, he’s already breaking some of Joe Montana’s early records. No, I’m not prepared to call him the “next Montana.” THAT, he’s got to prove over time. There’s no short cut. But, given that time, he really might be able to prove it.

I have a friend who argues that the talent experts in the NFL saw something about Purdy they didn’t like, which explains why he was relegated to the last pick of the draft. My friend suggests these talent guys really know their stuff and, sooner or later, the flaw in Purdy’s play will be exposed. I’m not sure I agree with my friend on this. I’m not sure the talent guys really know so much. For me, the measure isn’t found in the number of late round drafts who didn’t perform. It’s found in the number of first and second round drafts who didn’t perform – ALL of whom were vetted by the talent scouts and dubbed first- or second-rounders.

Joe Montana was taken in the third round. Tom Brady wasn’t selected until the sixth round. Ryan Leaf (who?) was a consensus first round pick (though, in fairness, nobody said THE first pick…) So…maybe the “experts” are just plugging numbers into some formula and letting the algorithm sort it out. Purdy fell until the late rounds – infamously, now, the last pick of the last round – likely because he’s not what the NFL has termed tall enough to play Quarterback. (He’s just over six feet tall.) Now, though, it looks like Purdy will be the new starting Quarterback of the Forty Niners going forward. He should be. He’s the best player they’ve had at that position since, well, honestly since the Montana/Young years. But it took a series of unexpected events to get him there. Not ONE of the so-called “experts” found this, particular, diamond in the rough.

He faces what I think will be his toughest challenge today. I’ve been a Niner fan for a long time. As a result, I have…feelings about the Dallas Cowboy I shouldn’t write in this space. But one has to respect the talent and the success they’ve managed this season. They’re a VERY good team. But so are the Niners. In fact, on paper, largely because of Purdy (and the addition of Christian McCaffrey), I think the Niners are better overall. They should win what I expect to be a tough fight. Of course, that’s why they play the games, right?

Whoever wins, they’re off to Philadelphia to face a rather daunting Eagles team next week. This time of year, that MUST equate to an advantage for the Eagles. So these (hopefully) next two games will be the toughest the Niners have played this year. I don’t plan to miss a minute of it…

Let’s say I landed a job because my resume read, in part, that I had a Master’s Degree from Harvard Business School, when I don’t, and I, personally invented the Graphical User Interface (GUI), which I did not (it was actually invented by Xerox), and I had saved a floundering international corporation from ruin with my insightful brilliance and careful guidance, also untrue. Then, my new boss found out none of those things were true. Do you think they’d feel like, “Well, we hired him. We chose that guy so now we have to stick with him?” Or do you suspect they might react to the news that my entire resume was – at best – “inflated” and show me the door? I say it’s the “door” thing. They did NOT hire the guy they thought they hired. They hired the fraudulent guy I pretended to be.

But the cons have signed off on George Santos (very much an R). They said that since the voters of his district elected him, he has the right to stay. Then they put him on committees to prove they care nothing for honor or honesty. Saying George Santos is a bad guy but was “duly elected” by the voters is false. The voters thought they were electing someone who had done some things George Santos has not done. Who else gets to lie on his resume, get caught red-handed, and keep the job anyway? The answer is George Santos and ONLY George Santos and do you know why?

Special elections. New York would have to hold a special election to replace him – and there’s no guarantee another Republican would win such a race, particularly with the electorate mad at the GOP (and getting madder) for, well, everything, really. The cons might lose ONE seat, so they would rather the seat be filled with a known scoundrel. Demonstrates a LOT about conservative ethics…

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Are you familiar with the Amazon Smile program? It was a way to help a preferred charity by simply buying things from Amazon. It took a few extra steps to set up but was easy to do. My preferred charity was a small local organization called ‘SNAP cats.’ They rescue and re-home special needs cats. After I signed up, every eligible purchase I made from Amazon directed a small amount to the charity of my choice. It was not a single stream revenue source for charities. It was one of many sources.

But…it took potential money out of Jeff Bezos’ pocket and there can be NO greater sin that taking money out of Bezos’ pockets, so the Amazon Smile program is being shut down. The story is that they just ended up with so many charities, they weren’t having a big enough impact on any one charity. As we’ve already seen they were never supposed to have that big of an impact. They were simply one stream and, hey, anything helps.

To me, it’s yet another reason to avoid Amazon as much as possible. I’m not saying “boycott.” Just “avoid.” If you can get something somewhere else, do so. Find what you’re looking for on Amazon. THEN, go to the company’s web page and order directly from them if you can. (If you can’t, you can’t.) It’s just Capitalism. That’s the story. But in order for any transaction to be honestly Capitalist, both parties must enjoy a legitimate opportunity to say “no.” So avoiding purchasing from Amazon is Capitalism in action.

The only way to stop these Capitalist juggernauts from steamrolling the world is if we close our wallets to them. Capitalism doesn’t work without Capital. So if enough of us close our wallets to Amazon, they’ll notice. If nothing else, maybe we can get them to return to their charitable donation program and at least pretend they care about something besides the bottom line…

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Let’s say I have a plumbing problem in my house. Is the correct answer a) address and correct the problem? or b) burn the effing house to the ground? If you chose b), you’re clearly a Republican.

If you ever needed proof that Republicans actually hate the United States of America, you’re getting it in the form of the current “budget battle” being waged by Republicans against all Americans and the country, itself. THEY will tell you, “No, the battle is against Democratic overspending.” But the spending is already set – and is quite bi-partisan. It’s most like running up your high-balance credit card, then quitting your job so you don’t have to pay the bill. If the money isn’t made available to pay the bills, the bills aren’t going to get paid. That isn’t correcting a problem or owning the libs. That’s burning down the entire economic structure of the United States – and the world. Defaulting on one’s financial obligations when one can pay isn’t shrewd. It’s irresponsible and destructive. The cons know this, of course, but that won’t stop them. In fact, based on all of the available evidence, that’s their goal…

It reminds me of the scene in ‘Blazing Saddles’ in which the new, black Sheriff of Rock Ridge is threatened by the oh-so-white townsfolk so he holds a gun to his own head and says, “Next man makes a move, the (I’m going to say…Sheriff) gets it.” Except it’s not a ploy on the con’s part. They WILL pull the trigger and blow out their own brains just to prove some moronic point. The vast majority of Americans, red and blue, will suffer as a result.

It’s been…something watching these fools trying to govern. The cons took back the House of Representatives in 2022 and came out shooting. Sure, they’re shooting their own feet, but they’re shooting. First they had their big “Speaker battle” episode, a little civil war among the ranks that effectively put the inmates in charge of the asylum. (It’s called the ‘tyranny of the minority.’) Now their sites are set on American financial solvency, which they’re against.

I’ll tell you this: It has become indisputable. Cons hate America. I know, they wave the flag more than anybody. They call themselves the “true Americans.” They “support the troops.” They insist on displaying their pseudo-patriotism at every turn. But it’s all a show. It’s all superficial bunk. Those trappings aren’t the meat and potatoes of a once-great nation. Waving the flag is performance art, nothing more. To hear them tell it – though not in so many words – they hate everything about the United States of America except the second half of the Second Amendment. And they only love that because (to them) it means that they may actually get to take up arms against their own country. Meanwhile, they oppose – and actively work to destroy – everything about this country that made it great in the first place and they’re not going to stop on their own. These days, if you vote Republican, you hate America. Period.

I once wrote a proposed law to address gun problems that I called The ‘Keep Your Gun Act.’ It took the position that people aren’t in much of a position to judge themselves no matter how clearly the rest of the world sees them. Hitler and his sycophants, for example, didn’t see themselves as evil – but everyone else does. In similar fashion, ALL people who own guns likely see themselves as “responsible” but we all know that not all of them are responsible.

We ALSO all know that every time someone proposes some common sense solution to address the gun problem in this once-great nation the NRA falsely promotes the idea that someone is coming to “take your guns” and the conversation dies at that point. So I decided to come at it from a different point of view. It’s MUCH harder to make the case that someone is plotting to take your guns if the law is called the ‘Keep Your Gun Act.’ It’s right there in the name: KEEP your gun.

The ‘Keep Your Gun Act’ is a two part law. One part raises the NRA’s rules of gun ownership to the Federal Law of Gun Ownership. As a quick review for those not up on the NRA’s rules, here they are:
1) Treat all guns as though they are always loaded.
2) Never let the muzzle point at anything you aren’t willing to destroy.
3) Keep your finger off the trigger until you have made the decision to shoot
4) Be certain of your target and what’s behind it.

The Keep Your Gun Act restricts law enforcement’s ability to simply “investigate” and then declare some event a “tragic accident.” In short, if someone except the owner has the owner’s gun or one of the four rules of gun ownership are violated, the gun owner MUST be charged accordingly. There are FAR too many good old boys who dismiss gun “errors,” leaving a dangerous weapon in the hands of a proven, irresponsible individual.

The other part requires people to keep their guns or transfer them legally. It sets out penalties for losing your gun through any other means and requires the gun owner to report the loss. (A successful defense requires a person to show the gun was stored as safely as possible, say, in a gun safe, for example.) If you don’t, you’re guilty of ‘Failure to Keep Your Gun,’ a Felony punishable by two years probation. If your “lost” gun is later used in a crime, you’re guilty of “Supplying a gun to a Criminal,” a Felony punishable by up to two years in prison. They’re both Felonies because a Felony precludes one’s right to legal ownership of guns. There’s already a process in place to have a conviction set aside and have one’s gun rights reinstated so it may not be permanent. It might be more of a “time-out.”

I’ll be honest, here. The goal IS to remove guns from irresponsible gun owners, as measured by their own reckless actions. MOST gun owners (even many irresponsible owners) never have an “incident.” Ergo, most gun owners would never run afoul of the ‘Keep Your Gun Act.’ Those who do? Society will decide if you’re a “responsible gun owner” through a fact-based court action.

Here’s an example: Let’s say you go out and buy a gun legally. Then you put it someplace where, say, a six year old can lay their hands on it, put it in their backpack, take it to school, and shoot their teacher. You’re not a responsible gun owner. Period. You shouldn’t be allowed to have guns because your irresponsible behavior puts the entire society at risk. And, bear in mind, I didn’t decide you weren’t responsible. YOU proved it…

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I’ve been on the fence about whether Joe Biden should run again or not. On the one hand, in real life, Biden has done a pretty good job. (Cons have no clue and think the world outside their doors looks like a ‘Mad Max’ style hell-scape.) On the other, Biden is pretty old. I have nothing against old people and I don’t think age, alone, should be the deciding factor. But when one sees signs of age-related “slippage?” Probably best not to put that person in the highest office in the land.

Recently, people have been discovering classified materials Biden was apparently responsible for in various places but, and this is important, not where they’re supposed to be. The first time? We were told they were co-mingled with papers regarding son Beau’s death. I thought Biden had misplaced them in his grief, still not okay but…understandable. The second time? I’m far less sanguine about the pretense that Biden handles classified information properly. But now there’s been a THIRD “find.” The “explanations” have “evolved” but always come to some form of “The President doesn’t know how they got there or forgot about them.” At some point, even the most loyal Democrat has to start questioning Biden’s handling of classified materials – and I’m not a Democrat.

It seems – at best – irresponsible. It does have the advantage, though, of demonstrating that, apparently, classified materials are mishandled on a fairly regular basis and the people responsible for those materials don’t seem to have a coherent system of tracking the materials and ensuring they’re properly returned. One of the most frustrating bits is that BIDEN has now opened the door to Former Guy generating a firestorm of “controversy” that may, yet, allow him to once again slither out of responsibility for his Obstruction of Justice.

I’ll tell you this: I hope Biden doesn’t run again. I think he’s too old, not because of his age, alone, but because he’s clearly showing signs of “slippage” and we simply should not have that in the most powerful office in the world…

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Ah, the debt ceiling. We’ve heard this story before. There are some conservatives who hate America so much, they will literally destroy it if they don’t get their whiny way. All they want is to comfort the wealthiest people and make everyone else suffer. That’s it. Now they’re in control of the House of Representatives and they’re already threatening to destroy the United States economic credibility if Biden and the Democrats don’t agree to harm old and disabled people. No, that’s not the way the phrase it. Of course not. But it IS the end result they seek and semantic games don’t change it.

“Spending cuts” is con-speak for cutting Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. To be clear, they are NOT talking about cutting spending for the military budget. Not even one nickle. Nor are they interested in withdrawing government subsidies to multi-national corporations. They CLEARLY oppose giving the IRS the tools to find tax cheats, thereby increasing revenues to the government. They ONLY want to harm old and disabled people. I blame the Democrats.

Vicious MAGA-con desires to inflict harm on the most defenseless members of our society are nothing new. They’ve been whining about the social safety net for years – decades, even. They’ve even shut down the government in the past to make it happen, risking America’s standing in the financial markets of the world. The Democrats have known this for as long as everyone else. During the most recent lame-duck Congress, the Democrats held the power and COULD have raised the debt ceiling high enough to cover the next two years in one fell swoop – but they didn’t.

I’ll tell you this: Actions speak louder than words. When a person or group CAN prevent horrible outcomes, but chooses not to? That speaks volumes to me. The Dems could have removed this particular weapon from the cons but didn’t. By choice. It suggests the Dems are perfectly willing to risk what tiny, little social safety net still exists in our submerging nation in exchange for political posturing. That attitude didn’t work out well with Roe v Wade and it won’t work out well with the debt ceiling…

There’s a guy named George Santos. He just got elected to the House of Representatives by…lying? Wait, let me check that. Yep. Lying. I’m not sure he shared a single, honest fact about himself. He inflated his resume, sparkled up his life accomplishments, and made claims of greatness that have been proven untrue. He’s the very definition of a lying liar.

So far, the GOP has chosen to do…nothing. Well, no, that’s not right. They’re going to weaken the powers of the Ethics Committee. Lying is a conservative stock-in-trade, why would they find it a problem? For them, it’s the Ethics Committee that represents the problem. Fortunately, new GOP Congressman George Santos is on the case and we can all rely upon him to negotiate the peace between left and right – just like he did when he negotiated the peace in the Middle East…

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As a measure of the GOP’s pretended desire for get government out of people’s lives, the Missouri State Legislature has just passed a rule requiring women to cover their arms on the state House floor. Those good old boys are threatened by a woman’s arm? I wonder what happens when they get a bit of…ankle… Yep, sounds like conservative “Freedumb” to me…

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Hey, is it true GOP Congressman George Santos wrote ‘War and Peace?’

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I can already hear the difference in tone regarding Biden’s mishandling of classified files and the conservative response to the former guy’s mishandling of classified files. Former guy whined. “Whaaa!” he whined. His supporters whined. “Those DemocRATS are being mean to our guy! Whaaa! It’s a witch hunt! Whaaa!”

Someone asked Democrat Chuck Schumer what he thought about looking into Biden’s mishandling of classified files and he said he supported the appointment of Robert Hur in the Biden case. Not ONE claim of a witch hunt.

Huh…

The GOP is already focused on the Biden files like a thirteen year old boy who has just seen his first real life boobies. (It seems to be having a similar effect, too.) Between Joe’s files and Hunter’s – something, they’re just sure of it – the children are going to be busy for awhile. Since their stated goal from their recent “closed door meeting” included eliminating Social Security, Medicare, AND Medicaid (at least according to CNN), I’m perfectly happy to let them engage in their respective performances, instead.

They’ve got at least THREE separate committees looking into the matter. Three. I kind of hope the Dems do things to stonewall and fight back. Mostly because it will be fun listening to conservatives explain why Democratic pushback is unconscionable so soon after explaining why their pushback was – and is still – perfectly reasonable…

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I was amazed to learn that GOP Congressman George Santos, not Neil Armstrong, was the first man to set foot on the moon…

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Former guy might be in more trouble. The Georgia Grand Jury looking into whether or not he tried to influence the election by calling the Secretary of State and pressuring him to try and “find” 11,780 more votes – because that was the number he needed to win – has handed down their decision and asked that it be made public. I heard that recording. He definitely did what he’s accused of doing. On the other hand, Georgia is a red state and jury nullification is a real thing -see Impeachments 1 and 2. (“Impeachments 1 and 2” sounds like books in the Bible…)

Georgia did the right thing when they told Former to get stuffed. Here’s hoping they’ll do the right thing again…

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GOP Congressman George Santos’ claims to have been the ACTUAL author of the works of Shakespeare strain credibility, don’t they?

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One of the most powerful conservative “stink tanks” in America is called the Heritage Foundation. There’s a report out that they spent MILLIONS of dollars in this last election on voter suppression measures in battleground states. According to the Guardian, the plan ‘proposed a two-pronged approach that would work to block moves by Democrats in Congress to bolster voting rights while at the same time pressing Republican-controlled states to impose restrictions on access to the ballot box. It said: “Where Democrats hold power, we must defend against bad policy. Where conservatives and our allies are in power, we must advance changes that protect the lawful votes of Americans.”’

If it wasn’t for cheating (and lying, of course) Republicans would never win an election again. Ever. As an American, I say that if you have to cheat and lie your way to power, you shouldn’t be in power…

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Say what you want about GOP Congressman George Santos. He’s a great man. Just ask him. He’ll tell you…

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I would like to take a second, here, and thank the 49ers for the entertaining season (so far). To the best of my knowledge, none of them read me nor would they care whether I’m happy or not, but still… They play in the first game of the Wild Card Round in the playoffs today against the Seattle Seahawks. The Niners should win but the weather is an balancing factor. If the Niners win? Great. If they lose? It’s going to put a damper on my enthusiasm for the rest of the weekend games and I’ll likely forget how much I’ve enjoyed the season.

It’s a good thing they just signed GOP Congressman George Santos to be the bell-cow running back. The ‘hawks don’t stand a chance now…