I continue to be impressed with the depths the cons will go to in an effort to deny facts they don’t like. I persist in believing they’re mostly being deceived by the conservative bubble but after awhile, it really doesn’t matter.

If I understand this correctly, George Soros created the Coronavirus because he wanted Bill Gates to get a vaccine that will make China cry and the Nashville bombing was a ploy to cover up the whole thing. Okay, maybe that’s not quite right. But it DOES make as much sense as the alternative facts being peddled in the bubble. Whatever it is they’re smoking over there in con-land, it’s too powerful and their cognitive abilities are paying the price.

I read a letter to the Editor in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat this morning in which the writer was expressing his anger that over fifty courts have refused to even consider all of the evidence the trump campaign has. I believe the writer was sincere. He simply doesn’t know that the trump legal team didn’t bring any evidence, just…well, trumpery. He should know it. He could know it. He doesn’t WANT to know it. So how does one communicate with someone who has made a conscious choice to be wrong and insists on stubbornly sticking to their wrongheaded position? The answer is, you don’t.

On the up side, social media is much quieter. Boring, even…

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I’ve been watching as various (non-journalistic) outlets complain about the assorted and sundry elements found in the Covid relief bill. The thing is, Congress – in it’s never-estimable wisdom – pushed the Covid relief bill as part of a government funding bill. So cash relief for struggling Americans and unemployment enhancements are part of Covid relief and aid to foreign countries is part of the government funding. Putting the two out together was the perfect opportunity for opponents to misrepresent – and misrepresent they will…

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The question in my mind is whether the dumbass knew he was putting the GOP in such a precarious position with his demand for $2,000 dollars in place of the $600 the GOP was willing to go or was it just part of his tantrum? Moscow Mitch has shown ALL Americans that as long as he’s in charge, Americans are on their own. (Well, poor Americans, anyway. Congress is ALWAYS there for the rich.) When the dumbass called for more, Senate Democrats were quick to seize on the $2,000 dollar option. Republicans were forced to come out and say no, exposing their true colors.

I presume that down in Georgia, Democrats are hammering the message every day: it doesn’t matter which party you belong to, if you need a bit of help through this crisis you didn’t create, you’d BETTER vote Democrat because the Republicans have made their position clear: they HAVE to offer something as a political ploy to try and help in Georgia but it will be as little as possible and there will be nothing after this so…make that $600.00 last.

It’s cruel and it’s blind. The actual economic impact from Covid hasn’t even hit yet but it’s been racing at us for months like a freight train that can’t stop. As more and more people fall through the cracks, they’ll get desperate – then angry. I imagine Mitch’s plan is to try to point that anger at Biden. The cons will buy it. Hell, they’re already angry at all the failures of the not-yet-extant Biden administration. I don’t expect thinking people will, though. I don’t know what the one percent think will happen but history says it’s not going to be good for them…

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I was confronted by a couple of my con friends who wanted to know why I refused to give the dumbass the credit he deserves for bringing the vaccine so quickly. It turned out to be a beneficial exchange – for me, anyway. You see, I DID have concerns about how quickly the vaccine was developed. I trust science and if scientists say it’s safe, well, okay. But in looking into whether or not trump deserves credit, I discovered some things I thought I’d share here for your (possible) peace of mind. What follows is my (slightly edited) response:

Here’s the thing: you guys are acting like trump donned a lab coat and started peering through microscopes and cutting RNA. (I get that. When the reality of the Chosen One falls short, glorifying stories ensue. Always.) But he didn’t do that. He doesn’t even seem to understand Covid-19 is real. Now, the one thing we CAN agree on is that Operation Warp Speed (OWS) promised a huge pot of money for development of a vaccine, yes? As you’ve indicated, the conservative bubble is crediting OWS with the unprecedented speed of development. As is usually the case, the conservative bubble is twisting the details to present a less than accurate complete picture.

You see, it’s not like the world was sitting around waiting for Americans to develop a vaccine. Most of the first world knew of the need and began working on options long before OWS. OWS was launched in May – only FIVE months AFTER the need for a vaccine became apparent. So…late to the party. How late? Well, the company that actually developed the first successful vaccine was NOT Pfizer. It wasn’t even an American company. It was created by a small German company called BioNTech. It was in human trials in Germany in MARCH. That would be two months BEFORE OWS even launched.

More, the Pfizer/BioNTech partnership didn’t use OWS money. They self-funded. I’m not trying to be unfair. OWS DID sign an agreement with Pfizer to buy 100 million doses and knowing they had access to the American market certainly didn’t dissuade Pfizer. This particular forward thinking move was offset a bit by the administration’s decision to NOT commit to another 100 million doses Pfizer had offered without risk – which now means we’ll all have to wait longer. Either way, because Pfizer self-funded, they were not going to get paid at all if they didn’t come up with a success.

Actually more important to the development speed, though, is the fact that most of the drug companies had a head start. Because of SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) and MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome), both forms of Coronavirus, scientists knew where to start. They had already started working on vaccines for those two forms in the past. They stopped the SARS effort because of money when SARS petered out. But they STILL had the information they needed and scientists had continued working on a MERS vaccine since 2013. In short, this current vaccine became available so quickly because the world had already been working on it. Much of the groundwork had already been done before anybody had ever even heard of Covid-19.

Trump DOES deserve credit for this: his complete failure to effectively address the problem in the first place created HUGE waves of infections (and deaths). That gave the testing protocol lots and lots and lots of potential test subjects. In other words, if Trump had been better at flattening the curve, testers would have had to wait longer to find viable subjects. So, I guess there’s that…

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Best hopes and wishes from My Bacon Press to you for the upcoming new year. We’re finally getting rid of the vile pestilence – and Covid-19 is going to go away, too! Happy New Year!

I believe Joe Biden is just offering up an olive branch to the Republicans when he says he thinks he’ll be able to work with them but I wish he’d stop saying so. It sounds nice but naive. The Republicans aren’t even pretending to work across the aisle. Their “position” is that Democrats are illegitimate. Moscow Mitch declared at the beginning of Obama’s administration that his goal was to ensure Obama was a one-term President. (Job well done, eh?) I haven’t heard him say the same about the incoming Biden administration but Republicans certainly have already retreated to their anti-Democrat stance. Joe may be willing to work with Republicans but Republicans WILL NOT work with Joe. Period. Joe needs to approach his new job with a firm grip on that knowledge. I’m wary because “reaching across the aisle” was the line that shielded Obama from accomplishing too much for the American people…

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I’ve got to say, trump’s meltdown is becoming SO severe I’m starting to feel sorry for him. I mean, up until now I felt, in order, contempt then disbelief. After that came embarrassment. I genuinely felt embarrassed for him. Now? Jesus, it’s just…SO pathetic. Losing to Joe (60 times!) seems to have really and finally broken him. NONE of his usual coping techniques – the “tools” that have taken him this far in life – (denial, name-calling, threats, bribes, lawsuits, and tantrums) have worked. No matter WHAT he does, facts remain facts and he knows – everybody knows – that HE’S the biggest loser!

You know who else thinks this current trump show is pathetic, disgusting, and embarrassing? Karl Rove! Karl says that Americans LOVE a comeback story but they HATE a sore loser. A rational person would get it. When Karl Rove says you’ve gone too far, you can rest assured you’ve gone too far!

As a result of the trump tantrum, 45 is doing as much damage as he possibly can on his way out the door. He’s rolling back regulations. He’s still firing people and installing lackeys. He’s STILL got his cowed and cowardly Senate pushing as many “conservative” judges as possible. He’s like a little brat with a gun and an endless clip. He’s just blasting away at America in every way he can at every chance he gets.

Okay, well, that didn’t last long. I’m back to contempt…

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Generally, I don’t have anything against the Swedes. They seem like nice enough people. But I sure got tired of hearing about them from the anti-mask, anti-lock-down contrarians. Apparently, the Swedes were going after the misinterpreted form of herd immunity. You know, the one where we just let people get sick and die off until the bug just…stops. In this model, the “immunity” is derived from the near-extinction of the herd. It’s exactly the kind of “misinterpretation” (read: lie) the Heritage Foundation or Cato are famous for and apparently, Sweden fell for it.

Now, because they didn’t react well to the pandemic, Swedes are dying at record levels – just like in the good old USA – and for the same reason! Stephen Colbert said it best: “It’s almost as if doing nothing has done nothing.” Well, it IS decreasing the surplus population. Ebenezer Scrooge would be pleased…

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In the meantime, Congressional Contrarians continue to obstruct efforts to help Americans most in need as a result of the feckless response to trump’s pandemic. This is going to be a rough ride because I’m certain Moscow Mitch has already pegged the impending economic disaster as a great political opportunity. All he’s got to do is prevent any (or, sufficient, at least) disaster relief from reaching Joe Six-pack. (To hell with desperate American people. It’ll be good for the party!)

The economic time-bomb awaiting us all is in rent relief. As it stands, there’s a hold on rent payments for anybody who loses income because of Covid-19. Great. BUT…once trump’s pandemic is controlled, all back rent will become due. Yeah, good luck with that.

The very fabric of this once-great nation has been reduced to pure, selfish greed. It’s not like the majority of landlords out there are offering up units at the lowest price possible. The mantra is, whatever the market can bear, remember? They take top dollar and then squeeze a little harder. The working class is already working multiple jobs and scrambling desperately each month in an effort to make just one month’s rent. How the hell are they supposed to pay back nearly a YEAR’S worth?

Economists generally agree the economic downturn associated with trump’s pandemic isn’t structural. The thinking is that once the pandemic is controlled people will go back out and start spending again. Right now? I agree, it isn’t structural. But once those rent payments become due, it won’t be money that follows. It will be bankruptcies and evictions.

Yes, I get it. Landlords aren’t evil. They’ve made an investment. Their resources are often tied up in these units so the downturn is as devastating to them as to the tenants who stand to lose their homes. In this, the “Greatest Country On Earth”^tm Congress could just make the payments. But, apparently, THAT would be a “handout” and we just don’t have enough for a handout to desperate Americans AND defense contractors (or Joel Osteen, who took 4.4 million taxpayer dollars for his megachurch that doesn’t pay taxes) so Average Joe is on his own.

Somehow, I don’t think the millionaires and billionaires running this once-great nation have a solid handle on what life is like for those of us born without a silver spoon…

I suspect the Dems had better get ready to get their asses handed to them again. On the one hand, they know they couldn’t have beaten the dumbass without the support of Progressives. On the other hand, they know that the Progressives didn’t come out for the Democrats so much as in their own interests – the enemy of my enemy is my friend, kind of thing. But here’s the thing; both statements are true. Progressives were serving their own interest…but Democrats CAN’T win without Progressive support – and they’re quickly squandering said support.

Progressives who manage to make it to Congress find themselves marginalized. The center-right Democratic party just doesn’t want to hear from anyone trying to help the American people. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (‘AOC’ to most) is arguably one of the most outspoken Progressives in Congress. She was fighting for a seat on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which oversees everything from health care policy to climate issues. Establishment Dems stood squarely against her. They were concerned that she would bring Progressive ideas to the committee.

The cracks in the alliance began almost immediately after the “election” as Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren were bypassed for office after office in the new Democratic administration, though the logic of not plucking Democrats from states with Republican Governors from the Senate is inescapable. So the Dems had built-in protection for snubbing Progressives that way. But marginalizing AOC specifically BECAUSE she’ll work for the majority of Americans? That’s a bad move with bad optics. Progressives are watching – and not happy.

The corporate supported/supporting Democrats tried to dictate to Progressives in 2016, remember? They insisted that Progressives will do as they’re told by the party, thereby inflicting Donald Trump on the world. Progressives allied with Democrats in 2020 – it’s true, for their own protection – to help the party undo the damage they created in 2016 but it was a temporary alliance, dependent entirely on gaining a bit of recognition for our contribution regardless of our motivations – because the Dems STILL need us. Putting AOC on the committee would certainly have been a way to throw Progressives a bone but they wouldn’t even do that…

Stupid Democrats. Independent Progressives have NO loyalty to your stupid party and I don’t expect they ever will. Democrats get to dictate to party loyalists and no one else. You do not, have not, will not dictate to Progressives how they vote and, for their part, they will not stay allied with a group that keeps poking them in the eye. We did not come out FOR your incremental baby-steps, corporate candidate. (Sadly, Progressives expect very little…well, progress…from the Biden Administration.) We came out against the Orange Moron. So far, Democrats have “recognized” the Progressive contribution by slapping Progressives in the face over and over. That’s probably not going to engender support going forward.

Look, everyone knows the Republicans are the Vanguard of the One Percent’s class war against Americans but Progressives see the Democrats as little more than the One Percent’s second rank. Sure, Progressives will help the Democrats against Authoritarians and/or Fascists but we STILL oppose the Democrat’s corporate, one-percent-loving agenda. Progressives STILL want to see the complete annihilation of this stupid, failed, and fraudulent “Supply Side” (aka, “trickle-down” or “voodoo”) economics and a return to the balancing effects of FDR’s New Deal – the system that made America great in the first place. The Dems are going to have to give us something – or they’re going to have to go it alone…

Have you ever seen one of those videos of people putting rubber bands on watermelons? Granted, you have better things to do with your time than sitting around watching videos of people putting rubber bands on watermelons but you should watch at least one. That way, for the rest of your life you’ll be able to say you’ve seen what happens and nobody can ever take that away from you! (Click here to watch a short one.) All right, since I know some of you didn’t click, I’ll tell you. As rubber bands are added, the watermelon begins to lose it’s shape.

At some point – often without warning – the watermelon explodes. (Technically, I guess it implodes since the pressure is from the outside in. Either way, though, you end up with a mess of watermelon all over everything.) There’s even a challenge among people to see who puts on the last rubber band, that kind of thing. Really, it’s not what you think. Some watermelons can take as many as 1,000 rubber bands before breaking and the anticipation is pure suspense…

Have you ever heard of the Dow? (What, no segue? Don’t worry, I’ll tie it together…) Of course you have. It’s on every news report at some point. When it’s up, it’s often in a little box in the corner on the screen so we can watch our glorious economy grow and grow. (I’ve noticed that when it’s “off” – don’t say “down” – they hide the window…) Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman has three rules about the Dow. One, the Dow is not the economy. Two, the Dow is not the economy. Three, the Dow is not the economy. Those three rules are axioms. The Dow is not the economy. But you know what? It used to be. Or, rather, it used to be a solid indicator.

When the Dow was created, it was the Dow Jones Industrial Average and it collected together the most important industrial stocks in this once-great nation, creating a useful snapshot of the overall state of the economy at a given point. “The Dow,” as it was referred to, measured the output of things companies made or built or moved. But those industries are, mostly, gone, now. They’ve either collapsed entirely, become only shadows of their former selves, or they’ve been off-shored. As those industrial stocks sank, they were replaced by financial services stocks. “The Dow” became the Dow Jones Index but continued, deceptively, to present under the same name. It confuses people who don’t realize it just ain’t what it used to be. Financial services make nothing, build nothing, move nothing but paper. They create financial value for a very small number of people almost always at the expense of a large number of people.

My favorite current example is Toys R Us. (Sorry, I don’t know how to type a backwards ‘R’…) Toys R Us was once a thriving, going concern. They were doing just fine, thank you very much. They did SO well, they caught the eye of financial services people – never a good thing. The money people decided they wanted to own Toys R Us so they borrowed a massive amount of money and forced a buyout. THEN they stuck the debt load on Toys R Us. Toys R Us didn’t create the debt. They wouldn’t have because they knew they couldn’t manage it. The corporate raiders took everything of value from the company and then let it collapse under the weight of a debt Toys R Us didn’t want or incur in the first place. Tony Soprano called the same behavior a “bust-out.” A few people made a LOT of money. Tens of thousands of people lost their jobs in one fell swoop and the domino effect of closed stores and lost jobs harmed the economy across the land.

Sure, maybe just a little, overall, in the grand scheme. But that is just one event. This kind of thing has been going on across the land in industry after industry for something like 40 years, now. Once upon a time, thanks to FDR and the New Deal, the United States really DID have the greatest economy in the world so they’ve been able to paper over the effects of their rampage for a long time. But the stresses of our gutted society are beginning to show through with unmistakable impact. We all know the list. We can’t provide clean water. We can’t fix our roads. We can’t educate our young. We can’t provide health care to our population. Homelessness is becoming epidemic. But the Dow is up! Woo-hoo! Oh, My GOD, the news readers excitedly report, the Dow just passed 30,000!

The thing is, I’ve come to understand a rubber band on a watermelon as a metaphor for each and every point tick up in the Dow. (I told you it would all come together…) You see, that 30,000 number represents nothing so well as the success rich people have had extracting wealth from everyone else. I understand the Dow as a CEO happiness index, not a measure of the health of the US economy. These days, CEO’s are happy when the company’s bottom line increases. As an example, the CEO of PG&E realized he could increase his take home pay if they just eliminated the expense of maintaining the lines and equipment – so they stopped. It worked, too. Keeping expenses down raised the stock value. The CEO got more money.

Sure, he literally burned Paradise to the ground, wiping out the lives and livelihoods of countless people. Just one rubber band. In fact, PG&E maintenance failures have now been faulted in many of California’s fires. A few more rubber bands. But that one guy made a LOT of money. One guy benefits. Thousands suffer. The Dow ticks up. A rubber band. Toys R Us is busted out. Another rubber band. Flint, Michigan can’t get clean, safe water. A rubber band. People can’t earn a living wage and are told it’s their own fault. Add a rubber band. People agitate, then protest. Cops deploy water cannons, each one a rubber band.

Winston Churchill has a quote, ‘The farther back you can look, the farther forward you are likely to see.” What that means is that past is prologue. History tells us not only where we’ve been but where we’re likely going. We’ve all been watching the financial gutting of our country ever since Ronald Reagan inflicted voo-doo (aka, “supply side”) economics on us. We know that the takers in our society, the richest 1 percent, will never stop taking and never stop using their exaggerated market power to KEEP on taking. But we ALSO know that eventually, people just won’t have enough to function in the world. Anger sets in. People look for someone to blame. Right now, poor people are being told their problem is OTHER poor people but sooner or later, people will figure it out. America has been fighting a class war and the rich people have taken an early and decisive lead. But look back. History makes clear that, sooner or later, there’s going to be one too many rubber bands on the watermelon.

The suspense is killing me…

This is true. I’ve got a serious conflict within me about wearing masks. No, I’m not opposed. I know they’re important and I understand why. Accordingly, when I need to wear one, I wear one. But after nearly a year having to mask up to buy milk, I’m REALLY tired of them. So, every time I have to don one, I find myself cursing trump’s name for his complete and utter failure to address the problem in a competent way. Or at all, really. But at the SAME time, I’m very aware that if Trump HAD addressed Covid-19 effectively, there’s a VERY good chance he might have “won” the “election.”

I wonder if there’s a word for being cursed (STILL wearing the mask) and blessed (rid of him) at the exact same time…

Just in passing, I find it a bit scary that TWICE, now, this country has been saved from collapse by illness. In the first case, the illness was Polio. FDR contracted it. In an effort to overcome it, he went to a natural spring said to have healing properties. While there, he was – horror of horrors (for a child of wealth) – exposed to the “common man.” It gave him an insight wealthy people don’t normally have. It gave him an understanding of what life is like for the non-trust fund crowd. That knowledge a) created the New Deal and b) created the greatest middle class (and economy) the world had ever seen. (Cons have since destroyed it…)

The second illness is the current Novel Coronavirus known as Covid-19. More than any other single factor, the failure of the dumbass to respond effectively to Covid-19 even as the death toll rose inexorably forced a change in the way elections operate and, likely, saved America from authoritarianism – at least for now.

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The devil went down to Georgia, he was looking for an election to steal. He was in a bind because he was WAY behind and he kept trying to make a deal…

(Sorry, Charlie…)

The GOP was nervous about the Dumbass giving a speech in support of their two candidates, David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler. They were nervous he would focus only on himself and his delusions about the recent “election.” They were mostly right, although he did, apparently, finally get around to encouraging his votaries to come out for the run-off.

They will, too. Right now, the cons are out whining about how unfair the election was and how rigged the process is. There’s a logical response to an unfair process: don’t participate. Some of the most extreme members are calling loudly (always loudly) on other cons not to turn out for the GOP. Some on the left are hoping the boycott catches on. I don’t mean to be a wet blanket, here, but it won’t. EVERY GOP and con voter will turn out dependably. They just do. Sure, they’ll be happy to complain about – well, about everything, really – but specifically, they’ll bitch about the unfair process right up until the day they participate in it again. But make no mistake, participate they will.

Interestingly, there may be a surge in paper ballots. I know lefties aren’t supposed to say this because the cons are saying it but there’s just too much evidence that the voting machines are not trustworthy or secure to ignore. I think so many being forced to use paper in November – confounding Trump’s “certain” win – demonstrated the point. Cons know they lost on paper, too. My guess is, they’ll boycott the machines in favor of paper this time. Dems and Progressives had better do the same…

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Speaking of Dems and Progressives, I’m kind of sad-laughing at my Progressive counterparts. Generally speaking, they’re the most intelligent of our society. (Hey, is that blatant pandering or just self-serving cockalorum?) They understand things on a level most Americans do not – say, for instance, that FDR’s New Deal was FAR better than today’s Screwed Deal. But they’re all butt-hurt that Biden isn’t picking more Progressives for his cabinet. Progressives pretend that since they came out “to help the Democrats,” the Dems owe them something – some kind of consideration.

But for THEIR part, the Dems know Progressives didn’t come out “for them.” We came out for ourselves. More accurately, we came out for our country. We knew that Trump HAD to be stopped and for a short, wonderful while, there, the goals of the Democrats and Progressives converged to our mutual benefit. But Trump has been defeated – something like 46 times, now! (I mean, he is SUCH a loser!) Progressives immediately returned to, “Hey, let’s make this country better!” and the Democrats immediately returned to “Let’s make sure not to rock the boat too much” and the conflict heated right up again.

We’ll figure it out. The important part is that, for now, the dumbass contingent has been stopped…

The conservatives seem to have exited, stage…well, I don’t know where they went but they’re gone for now. Truthfully? It has been peaceful but rather boring. I guess Zuckerberg was on to something in promoting “debate” between fact and fiction.

I think they’ll be back though, frothing, amped up on alternative facts, and ready to fight. I’m ready, too. In the meantime, though, I’m enjoying the respite…

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The Loser’s lawyers keep walking into courts and saying the election was rigged. The “evidence” they present? ‘We don’t like the results.’ The remedy they seek? ‘Let’s just not count votes for Biden!’ Sure, it’s clever. Wily, even. Unfortunately (for them), it’s not democracy. We’re going to go ahead and count the votes.

One guy gave 2.5 MILLION dollars to help fight democracy. Too late, he realized he’s been duped and wants his money back. I’m guessing he’s not going to get it. I hope he doesn’t, a fool and his money being as they are. The fine print of these campaigns made clear that they were going to redirect money from the legal effort for various reasons.

It’s an expensive lesson but I guess he just got 2.5 million reasons to learn to pay more attention to actual facts and less attention to “alternative facts” (aka, “bullshit…”)

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The internet seems like it’s been infecting our lives forever, now, but that isn’t really true. I’m older than the internet and I remember the early, wild-and-woolly days when the world wide web went public. One of the most prominent features of the day? Easy, albeit slow, access to porn. No, that’s a different column. The prominent feature I’m interested in here is computer viruses. (Ah, porn and viruses. They just go together, don’t they?) Viruses were EVERYWHERE. Rampant, even.

It isn’t that people weren’t trying. Many people knew they should have virus protection. Most didn’t realize anti-virus software has to be maintained. Some would try freeware. Some would buy something but not maintain it. Many just took their chances. The result? A pandemic of computer viruses. At some point, viruses were SO ubiquitous, people started to become wary about hooking up the old modem. Internet service providers (ISP’s) came to the conclusion that they had to take charge in the anti-virus department or the web might just become too dangerous a place to risk for most people and it might never take off…

Every decent ISP began including anti-virus software as part of their service. Even at that, viruses kept coming – although the new practice managed to “flatten the curve,” as the saying goes. It became clear that ISP’s were going to be on the hook for this if they wanted to reduce computer viruses. I believe every decent ISP will continue to include antivirus software as part of their service for their own good, let alone the good of their customers.

But are you a Comcast internet customer? Have you been using the anti-virus software they provide – I’m sorry, “once provided” – from Norton as part of their service? Well, then you need to know, Comcast is going to eliminate that portion of their service on January 1, 2021. And no, there will NOT be a commensurate drop in cost just because there’s a measurable drop in service quality.

Let us assume that both Symantec (Norton’s parent company) and Comcast are just greedy corporations trying to squeeze out as much as possible while doing as little as possible. (EVERY corporation wishes it could have the ‘give-us-your-money-for-nothing’ model but religion sewed that up generations ago. Now, everyone else has to do something…)

Now, Symantec’s lifeblood is virus protection. If they don’t do a good job, they’re gone. Comcast? Not so much. Symantec is financially motivated to protect against viruses. Comcast? Why would they care? Between the two, who do you think will do the best job of virus protection, the company whose job it is or the company that just cut off your virus protection?

In fairness, Comcast is claiming they have some protections built into their system but then, they claim they offer Gigabyte speeds that never get anywhere NEAR a Gigabyte. You should expect their “protection” to be just as weaselly. Even their own description of their system protection makes clear how vulnerable the entire network is going to be.

IF you use their gateway ($15.00/mo, thank you very much) and IF you never connect your device to any non-Comcast system, you might be safe. (You won’t be.) Comcast is shedding responsibility in order to cut costs, yes? Do you think they’re going to take on the cost of maintaining virus definitions or staying current against malware? How are they going to protect your end-user equipment if their already inadequate protection stops at their gateway?

No, if you’re a Comcast victim…er…customer, you now have to buy and maintain your own antivirus software. Since past behavior is a solid predictor of future behavior, I’m guessing people won’t – for a wide variety of reasons.

The best answer is to find a different ISP, one that still provides anti-virus protection. Just dropping Comcast altogether would register appropriate disapproval. But Comcast is, effectively, a monopoly. They know not everybody can do that. For example, I have limited options where I live so I’ll have to stay with Comcast internet. But now Comcast has hit me with an unexpected cost. MY plan is to get the money to pay for robust virus protection from Comcast – by dropping everything else.

I’ve been in the process of cutting the cord for sometime now, anyway. As it happens, Comcast television is little more than a convenience. I can watch pretty much whatever I want to watch outside of the Comcast system. It just not quite as neatly organized. As it happens, I don’t WANT to pay nearly $300.00 a month for a bit of organization. So I’ve been cutting back. Now, I’ll cut back the rest – except for internet service.

The change will minimize what comes out of my pocket in response to Comcast’s choice. More importantly, it will minimize what goes INTO Comcast’s pocket – and reducing their revenues is really the only language they’ll understand…

I suppose it would be easy enough to, perhaps, admire Donald Trump’s life, if one takes a quick, superficial look. After all, he was handed hundreds of millions of dollars by the time he was four years old. He lived a pampered and entitled life. He never knew one day of adversity. And then? At the other end of his life, he gets to be President of the United States. Pretty sweet…

I wrote a song, once, that included the line, ‘I know, things aren’t always what they seem to be.’ (You sang it, didn’t you Jeff?) So let’s consider that same information a bit differently. Trump was handed hundreds of millions of dollars by the time he was four years old. He lived a pampered and entitled life. He never knew one day of adversity. But there’s an old saying: adversity builds character. A person who never knew one day of adversity would never have had the opportunity to develop as a human being, never have had the chance to build character.

Instead, Trump built a persona. In truth, I think many people liked the person he pretended to be. If nothing else, the viewing public was…intrigued. I suspect that if he and his crime family had stuck to the shadows he would have gotten away with the deception. But then? At the other end of his life, he got to be the President of the United States.

That’s not nothing. You are in the limelight as President. If I may quote Lin Manuel Miranda, “history has it’s eyes on you.” People pay attention to everything you do, everything you say. Everything. Very few were fooled by Trump anymore and those who were, mostly, were willfully ignorant. The persona had been ripped away. What was left is the wretched shell of a failed human – a person who literally embodies every one of the seven deadly sins. Pride, Envy, Gluttony, Lust, Avarice, Wrath, and Sloth – every one. Hell, he’s SUCH a failed human being, he even added one of his own: Mendacity. The guy lies for no reason at all! At this point, he seems absurd…

Benito Mussolini was once understood the be the most absurd authoritarian in history. I believe old Benito can sleep well tonight as the torch has been passed. Donald J Trump will, hereby, reign as the new champion absurd authoritarian going forward. (And you know it’s true because I included the word ‘hereby…’)

Oh, sure, a handful of conservatives, today, will make efforts to consecrate his name. Some hack, Heritage Foundation pseudo-historian will write a book that details the long list of alternate facts attributed as Trump “achievements” and the rank and file will sing his praises – for a while. The book will be mass ordered by conservative outlets and made a “best seller” but then the orders will be returned or “remaindered.” Eventually, the books will be ground up or just tossed out. History won’t remember them because they won’t be historically accurate.

The rank and file? These days, conservatives are having difficulty with basic science so their input doesn’t have much use or value anyway. After Trump leaves, the “base” will be moved on to other, new “positions du jour” and the specter of Trump will slowly fade as a day-to-day force. In the end, the harsh reality is that his supporters will eventually just…die off. All of today’s “alternative facts” will evaporate over time and efforts at character rehabilitation will become fewer and fewer. All that will be left, eventually, is history’s judgement.

I have no doubt that history will show that the money he was handed and that created such a comfortable life ALSO created a vacuous, gauche, rather vile human being. Being President stripped away his human persona and left behind the exposed, true person. It’s the failed, rude, vulgar, useless, and inept person, the one with no character, the TRUE Donald J. Trump, history will record as the 45th President of the United States. And THAT will be for all time…

I don’t know how I feel about Gavin’s Curfew but I’m pretty sure if I get caught violating, I’ll get away with an apology so long as I call it a lapse in judgement. You know, like Newsom did with his little birthday party stunt in which he undermined all of his credibility on the mask topic in one night.

What Gavin did was Trump-level stupid…

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I’m seeing more and more stories about judges issuing “stinging rebukes” to Trump “attorneys.” It turns out that, while everyone wants honest elections (scare stories from the right notwithstanding) the cases being brought to court boil down to “Well, your honor, we just really don’t like the results.” Generally speaking, courts are willing to hear your case but they REALLY don’t like to have their time wasted.

So Trump lost the election and now he’s losing in court – and losing, and losing, and losing. So far, he’s lost this election 28 times! (November 3rd and then 27 whiny lawsuits.) Hell, by the time he’s done, Trump will be the biggest loser – the losingist loser – in the history of losers. He’s lost so many times, now – you’d think he’d get tired of losing…

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We’ve all heard of the woman who realizes after some time that the guy she’s been seeing isn’t right for her so she ends the relationship. The guy decides the only thing to do is post intimate photos of her on the internet. You know – to get “even.”

There are, of course, huge ramifications to such abusive, adolescent, obnoxious, and offensive behavior as “revenge porn” but the one aspect I’d like to focus on, here, is that beyond all else, posting of the photos proves – without question – that she made the right call in dumping his ass. The guy sucks and she CAN do better – easily.

I see Trump’s White House temper tantrum meltdown the same way. Yeah, sure, he can – and will – do damage on his way out the door. He’s going to harm a LOT of people – and there will be NO regard for whether they voted for him or Biden. He’s going scorched earth. I’m not looking forward to the effects of his tantrum but I know – without question – we made the right call in dumping his ass. The guy sucks and America CAN do better – easily…

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It strikes me, though, that we’re watching, in real time, the behavior that explains why every business Trump touches fails. Something doesn’t go his way, he quits and then seeks to punish anyone and everyone who had anything to do with it (except himself, of course)…

The “run away” response seems to be a family trait. Remember, grandpa Drumpf SO disgraced the family name through cowardice, he ran away from it, changing it to ‘Trump.’ Now that Donald has SO disgraced and tarnished the latest family name, ‘Trump’, I wonder what they’ll go to next. I suggest ‘Harumph…’

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To my mind, the only real question remaining is if the dumbass is going to try to pardon himself. Theoretically, it’s an open question of the Constitution as to whether a sitting President can pardon himself. From a standpoint of practical application, though, it’s immediately apparent that if a President can pardon himself, he’s no longer a “president.” He would be a “king” or an “emperor” or a “strongman.” Whatever the title, if he can pardon himself, he’s a “tyrant” who can do anything he wants any time he wants…

I’m a proponent of Euthanasia. Death with dignity, assisted suicide – whatever you prefer to call it, I’m for it. I even take the possibly extreme view that it shouldn’t be reserved ONLY to people with terminal illnesses. As far as I’m concerned, if you want to go, it should be your right to go. (This is an option thing. If one DOESN’T want to go, they shouldn’t be forced to…)

What’s more, I’m fully aware that people risk their health and safety all over the world, all day, every day. Sometimes because they have no choice – we all have to get to work and the roads are dangerous. Sometimes because of a choice taken – nobody forced you to climb El Capitan. People throw caution to the wind every day and nobody tries to stop them. Have at it. Bungee jump or sky-dive out of a perfectly good airplane for “fun”. Try to set a land speed record. Jump the fountains at Caesar’s Palace. Whatever. Hell, we’ll even watch…

I only mention it because the anti-mask crowd keeps crowing about how someone is trying to infringe on their rights by forcing them to wear a mask to protect themselves. “My body, my choice!” they shout, having lifted the slogan from the pro-choice crowd. Sure, they acknowledge, they might get sick but then they’ll get better. Nobody dies from Covid. Every doctor always lies. In short, their focus is on how Covid affects them. To my mind my mind, they’re looking at it all wrong…

Think of it this way: there’s a guy walking down the street. No, not the street – YOUR street. He’s got an AK-47 slung over a shoulder and he’s wearing a knit cap of some kind. (Yes, he’s wearing other clothes, too. This isn’t that kind of story…) He takes five steps along the road. Then he stops and pulls the knit cap down, making a blindfold. He takes the AK from his shoulder and twirls around three times. He levels the weapon and squeezes off a three round burst. Then he raises his cap, slings the rifle back over his shoulder, regains his bearing, and takes five more steps down the road, where he repeats the ritual. Two of his bullets shatter your front window.

As he’s putting the rifle back on his shoulder, the police arrive. Apparently, some democrap libtard called the police just because the guy is randomly spraying bullets around the neighborhood. Fortunately, as an anti-masker, you have a unique understanding of the law and its applications and you’re not aBOUT to let anybody infringe on this guy’s Second Amendment rights.

So…you step in to help the shooter against the cops. (Verbally, it’s not THAT kind of story, either!) You ask why the cops are trying to interfere with the guy owning a gun. You remind them the shooter has rights. The cops, obviously in thrall to imposing their will on people, seem overly focused on the danger he represents to the neighborhood.
“He’s shot seven people,” a cop explains.
“Seven people?” you demand. “Is that all? Do you know how many people live in this neighborhood? Hundreds. Seven people is just a tiny fraction, like .02 percent!”
“Two are dead, three are likely to die. One’s a kid,” the cop says, clearly irritated and displaying a bad attitude.
“They didn’t die from bullets!” you insist as though you know. “They had pre-existing conditions.”
But the cops won’t listen so you pull out the big guns, the “Final Argument” argument. “The danger is overstated,” you insist. ” Mostly, he hasn’t shot anybody. Of the people he HAS shot, most will recover.”
“What if his next burst hits you?” the cop asks.
“Oh, I’ll survive for sure and without question,” you assert having never been shot. “It’s only old folks who die, anyway, and we all know their value is behind them. But what you’re doing is a slow drip. You’re threatening his rights.”
“What about other people’s right NOT to get shot?” the cop asks.

Is there an answer? What ABOUT people’s right NOT to get shot by your droplets? Because, for clarity anti-maskers, in the above scenario, YOU are the shooter. Wearing a mask isn’t about YOU. It’s about everybody who’s NOT you that you come into contact with. I’ll say it again; this is America. People don’t give a flying fig about what you do to yourself. (Go ahead, have another cigarette.) But they DO care what you do to them. (Just don’t blow it into MY face…)

So…which of your arguments gives you the right to risk other people’s health and, possibly, lives? I’m genuinely interested…

I don’t believe it, you know. I mean, I DO believe that the Biden/Harris ticket won. The part I don’t believe is that Trump was able to increase his base – especially that much. I mean, really? How? To whom did he appeal who wasn’t already on his team? We learned from Lincoln, you can fool some of the people all of the time. Those are the 35% – Trump’s base. (I base that number on the percentage of people who come out to defend him – no matter what – in between elections. That, to me, is the true measure of his base…)

You could convince me that Trump drew beyond his base in 2016 with people angry at the shenanigans of the DNC, people dissatisfied with the incremental baby steps crowd, people who had been conditioned to effing HATE Hillary – viscerally – since 1992, and other disaffected voters adding to the…well, the true believers. But that’s the thing; the “add-ons” were NOT true believers. Once Trump was revealed, the add-ons fell away, quietly but pretty quickly. (I see the evidence of that mostly in people switching their party affiliation from Republican to Independent…)

So if he already had a lock on the bigot crowd and he already had a lock on the fooled-all-the-time crowd (and the one encompasses the other), where did he find the gain? Truthfully, I think the ONLY place he could increase is with children of conservatives, raised in conservative households and reaching voting age before experiencing the real world. And you know what there are NOT? Millions of those…

THEN, his true feelings about our military come out and then Covid-19 hits and Trump just…falls apart. How many old folks do you suppose withdrew their support, what with Trump literally dismissing them as expendable in response to Covid? How many in the military when they heard he considered them “suckers” and “losers” or insulted Gold Star families or abandoned American soldiers and allies? I can see all kinds of places where Trump LOST voters AND I can see that the 35% isn’t going anywhere ever. So how did Trump turn out nearly 50% of the vote?

Right away, on November 4, I started hearing chatter about how the polls were wrong, consistently opining that Trump had “over-performed.” Pollsters knew the polling didn’t reflect the outcome in 2016, either. In fact, polling, it seems has been off-track since the 2000 “election.” After each round, pollsters “adjust” their tactics, assuring us all that THIS year, they’ve got it right. Then it isn’t. Or is it?

I submit that it’s not the polling that is incorrect – it’s the outcomes. I’ve long held that the various computerized voting machines in use allow for vote manipulation like the country has never known (or understood). I’ve long been a proponent of voting by paper ballots to ensure the accuracy of the vote. (I’ve long been ignored on the topic.)

Yes, I know the right is complaining that the process is rigged because we counted the votes. MY position is that the votes we CAN’T double-check are the “rigged” votes. THOSE come from computerized voting machines and I think the worst are known as Direct Recording Electronic systems or DRE’s.

DRE’s employ computers that record votes directly into the computers’ memory. These interfaces may incorporate touchscreens, dials, or mechanical buttons. The voter’s choices are stored by the computer on a cartridge or hard drive. In 12 states, DRE systems are also equipped with Voter-Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) printers, which produce paper records that can be preserved to be tabulated in case of an audit or recount. 7 states (In, Ky, La, NJ, Ok, Tn, Tx) do not use VVPAT. 2 states (Ks, Ms) use some DRE’s with and some without VVPAT. (This paragraph was lifted from BallotPedia.org and modified for detail by me…)

I’m told my concerns about those machines qualify as tin-foil hat stuff. In general, Americans believe that the United States would NOT have rolled out computerized voting machines without protections to keep people from manipulating the outcome. It turns out, that’s just a matter of faith. It’s an unsubstantiated belief that keeps them from even considering the possibility that the machines can be used to rig the outcomes.

So before I go too much further, you really should watch this video. Seven minutes. It’s a guy named Clint Curtis who actually wrote code that could be hidden in the operating software and used to secretly flip votes as desired. I offer it as evidence. If you won’t give up seven minutes to watch the Curtis video, you likely won’t surrender and hour and a half to watch HBO’s ‘Kill Chain: The Cyber War on American’s Elections‘ but you really, REALLY should. (Special shoutout to Mrs. Dean. I hope you made it here. I told you the wrong name. ‘Kill Switch’ is a Steven Seagall movie. MyBaconPress regrets the error… )

There are many videos on the web showing just how easy it is. I went to a middling search engine and typed in ‘hacking voting machines’ and came up with a long list. Sure, can’t happen here. Except that 11 year olds can do it in under 10 minutes. So, maybe it’s tin-foil hat stuff. Maybe it’s something we should be aware of and address. Now that we know how easy it is, perhaps we should consider whether anyone might try to use such a system to their own advantage…

You’ve got to give credit where credit is due. Donald Trump really did turn out the vote. Sure, it was mostly hate voting to get rid of him but I truly doubt we would have had the response we had if the subject had been anything other than Trump so…props.

Because Trump chose to ignore Covid-19, states across this once-great nation were forced to use alternative methods for voting and the best practice was paper, mail-in ballots because every state already deals with them at one level or another and already had infrastructure in place. Trump worked as hard as he could against the mail-in ballots. He insisted people couldn’t trust mail-in ballots and encouraged his base to use the DRE’s. As it happens, the politics involved created a one-of-a-kind test run, red vs blue, computer vs paper.

The tallys are still coming in but I believe that when all is said and done, the states where only paper was used will be quite close to poll projections. The states that used machines will be…off. People will shrug and blame the polling techniques but we should at least consider the other possibility.

Perhaps the machines created an avalanche of red votes. I mean that the way it reads. Millions of people came out to get rid of Trump. Millions of people, blue and red, used the machines. The fact that a person can simply push a secret button and flip votes in individual machines (did you watch the Curtis video?) or do it with the dongle at the end of the day means the vote count would tally correctly but the outcome of the election would still be wrong. Such a tool explains how the vote flipping could be targeted so effectively as well. The Republicans don’t need to win everywhere. As we know, they only need to prevail in the Electoral College.

Since I started writing this, a statement was released in response to Republican claims of voter fraud in the machines attempting to assure Americans that the machines did their job properly. “There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised,” said a statement from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. If you’ve watched the videos I’ve recommended here, you know those are weasel words. “There is no evidence…” This is a true statement. The machines are built in such a way that they do NOT provide evidence nor keep records that can be reviewed. But that doesn’t mean the machines are honest.

So the only way to know if the election results were correct is to compare them against election day and exit polls. In most areas, it’s Trump who is said to have “over-performed” not Biden. If anything, the machines helped Trump, not Biden. I’m aware the claims from the right make my position, here, that much more Sisyphean but I maintain that we, the people MUST get rid of voting machines and return to paper ballots across this once-great nation if we’re ever to trust the process again.

We should just dump the machines. Every state, for every election, should use paper ballots. No matter how you slice it, paper ballots can’t be flipped. If a million people vote ‘yes’ on paper, a million ‘yes’ votes will be recorded – and can be recounted if necessary.

So, I guess we all owe Donald Trump a debt of gratitude for exposing the true corruption in the voting process: computerized voting machines. With those machines, Republicans don’t have a “finger on the scale” as the saying goes. They’re STANDING on the scale before anyone else steps up! (And NONE of this even begins to address GOP Gerrymandering…)

Now that Trump’s out, people are going to relax a little. Not so many will turn out next time. Only a small drop-off on the left and the extra weight the GOP brings disrupts an honest process again. I’ll tell you this: I REALLY hope we can get something done about eliminating the machines. I prefer elections to “elections.”