politics

Too Much, Too Long…

by MyBaconPress

Have you noticed the force around Luigi Mangione as they move him from place to place? It’s like every cop in New York is needed to escort this oh-so-dangerous man. Really, it’s one hell of a show. Yeah, he shot a guy in the back. Now, because the guy he shot was a CEO and, more importantly, rich, officials are charging him with terrorism – so they can put him to death.

Mangione was a very specific shooter. He’s not a threat to all of society. It’s not like he randomly shot up a school, killing anybody unfortunate enough to be in front of his barrel. Because he had – and achieved – a goal, I’d say he’s LESS of a threat. But 30 cops surround the guy like he’s Public Enemy Number One with a long list of murders to his name every time he gets moved.

It’s all a show. The masses are being “discouraged” from following his example by seeing the treatment Mangione receives as a result of his action. Expect it to be harsh. Publicly harsh. Expect it to end with Mangione sentenced to die. Hell, they might fast-track him to the gallows, just to make their point.

The message is, ‘don’t attack rich people’ but I’m not sure that’s the takeaway the public will go with. I haven’t seen any waning in people’s support for Mangione or his choice, despite the fact that we ALL think murder is bad. People see this killing as a kind of retribution, not murder. When they DO kill him, I suspect he’ll become a martyr, a rallying cry…

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Have you heard about this? A congresswoman from Texas, Kay Granger (R), has been living in a care facility for dementia patients at least the last six months. Her son tried to downplay the situation: “There’s nothing wrong with someone wanting to live in a community with other folks their age,” Brandon Granger said. He’s right. There IS nothing wrong with that. More, there’s nothing wrong with battling dementia. It’s sad, but it happens.

It’s the ‘battling dementia while holding a House seat’ part that concerns me. She hasn’t voted on the House floor since July. She hasn’t shown up at all, except for one photo op pretending she was a-okay. She has stepped down from her committee assignments. Oh, and she HAS continued to accept that sweet paycheck…

I’m not ripping on Granger, herself. We see this from time to time. We last saw it from Dianne Feinstein, who was no longer aware she WAS Dianne Feinstein much of the time, but maintained her position in the Senate. Useless, possibly even dangerous to her job, but holding the seat. The thing is, in Congress, this can only be about money, right?

Had Feinstein stepped down due to health issues, Democratic California Governor Gavin Newsom could be expected to replace her with another Democrat, so the balance of power would not be affected. That’s the exact same situation with Kay Granger. Her Governor, Greg Abbott, would likely have appointed a Republican, so, same outcome. But they stay. And stay. And stay.

Yes, it appears Joe Biden is battling some age issues, himself, and Ronald Reagan, famously, no longer knew he was Ronald Reagan by the end of his term. It just comes up from time to time. People get old and they don’t have control over dementia. Once it hits, it hits. But they don’t leave their offices.

Theoretically, their teams take care of them by keeping them out of public view and occasionally issuing statements in their candidate’s name but it’s essentially a seat held hostage in Congress. I might go so far as to assert it’s a kind of theft. EVERYONE is getting paid – from tax dollars – but nobody is doing the job they were hired to do. It’s no different than if you went to work every day but never did your job. Well, there IS one difference. Once your employer found out you were accepting the check but never contributing, you’d be let go.

I’m not normally an advocate for age restrictions but I think I’m leaning further and further that direction when it comes to Congress critters. For one thing, FAR too many of them are FAR too old, even if they’re NOT battling dementia. One gets out of touch with things as they age. The world moves pretty fast, these days, and it gets harder and harder to keep up.

Since people clearly can NOT be trusted to just gracefully step aside when, say, health conditions demand it, there should be a defined upper age limit. I genuinely appreciate the wisdom and perspective that can come with age but it’s not guaranteed and some people end up with dementia, instead. They shouldn’t be allowed to continue in such important roles.

What if we say 70? It’s a random, round number. 70 is old, but one is still likely to be in command of one’s faculties. Yes, we WILL lose some good people early but we have an obligation to protect ourselves from being governed by people who don’t even know who they are, let alone that they’re supposed to be governing…

A “Christian” Example?

by MyBaconPress

Wow. When President non-elect Musk decided to stick his privileged nose into the business of America, he DID create some upheaval. Cons had to cut something to try and make him happy. The thing that made Musk happy to cut? Cancer research for children. Yeah, that’s real.

A young lady, 10-year-old Gabriella Miller, died of an inoperable brain tumor. In 2014, an Act was passed in her name that funded research. It offered up $126 million over the following decade toward pediatric cancer research. It had to be re-authorized in 2024. The 2024 plan was to allocate $190 million for the next 10 years.

Pay attention to the kinds of numbers Congress talks about. Really, $190 million dollars over the course of 10 years is a drop in the bucket. It’s nothing. Here, let’s do a comparison. The average salary of a Congress critter is currently $174,000/yr. That’s base pay. They get perks and benefits and the leadership positions all get premiums, but let’s use that number. There are 535 voting members of Congress between the House and the Senate. Ready?

$174,000 x 535 = $93,090,000 per year.
Multiply their oh-so-generous annual salary by 10, the number of years the cancer research bill would have covered. It comes to $930, 900,000! We’re going to give those useless pieces of, um, politicians $931 million dollars over the next 10 years to do little more than posture and pose, but $190 million dollars to research cancer in children was just too much – a bridge too far – for Musk, so it had to go.

Here’s the real key. It was an easy target, low-hanging fruit. How many voters have kids with cancer? Personally, I think ONE is too many, but the hard truth is, whatever the number, there aren’t enough voting parents of kids with cancer to be a threatening bloc. So, maybe the cons can just quietly dump research into cancer in kids and save a few bucks.

Just like Jesus would have wanted. You know, because of “Christian morals…”

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My favorite thing about the pseudo-Christians (which is most of them, these days) is the unintended consequences of their oh-so-pure attitudes combined with their complete LACK of knowledge as to exactly what is in that book they pretend to revere, the Holy Bible. But in Texas, Canyon Independent School District Superintendent Darryl Flusche has announced that the Holy Bible, as a whole, is not suitable for inclusion in school libraries due to a Texas law intending to protect schools from sexually explicit content, though some individual stories from the Bible remain.

The law he cites, House Bill 900, defines sexually explicit material as “any communication, language, or material” that describes sexual conduct in a way that is “patently offensive” according to the Texas Penal Code. He didn’t specify which sexually explicit material he was referring to. Was it the rapes? The Coitus Interruptus? The incest? Who knows?

Apparently, NONE of those things, all of which are actually in the Bible, are deal-killers. Listening to the pseudo-Christians squeal about it is quite telling. One parent, a woman named Regina Kiehne told school officials, “It seems absurd to me that the Good Book was thrown out with the bad books. It just makes sense to have the Word of God in our school library. After all, it (the Bible) is the book of wisdom.”

In other words, the kids NEED to read the story of Lot’s daughters getting him drunk and sexing him up, right? I guess it helps explain why Uncle Daddy gets to do those things to the young girls. Did Ham sodomize Noah? Texas school kids need to know. Oh, maybe they get their examples of “morals” from Moses!

Oh, c’mon, you remember. It was that time he told his soldiers, “Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man. Hubba-hubba.” (Numbers 31:17) (I may have added a bit at the end, there.) That’s when the Israelites had been commanded to commit genocide against the Midianites. They had already killed all the men. So now they just needed to kill the rest – even babies, if they were boys! But not the virgin girls.

“Christian morals,” indeed…

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I live by a basic adage. It goes like this: When your out-go is greater than your income, your upkeep will be your downfall. It’s a good rule. It has the advantage of being undeniably true. The GOP has been working as hard as they can for the last 40+ years to convince everybody that the government of the United States is overspending and the ONLY way to address that problem is by cutting spending. Guess what? That’s wrong!

As it happens, there are TWO ways to address that problem, not one. Yes, one IS to cut spending and we should ALL want to be on the lookout for wasteful spending. (Pentagon, anyone?) It IS, after all, OUR money they’re spending. But there’s a better way. They could raise revenues. Think of it as getting a better job. (That’s what working Americans do when they want more money and can’t get it where they’re at.)

That involves tax increases. It’s clear that much of our society can’t face another tax shift from the wealthy. The rich really need to participate at a rate commensurate with the rate they extract from our society. That’s reasonable. It’s possible for the country to increase it’s revenues to address our financial woes. Financial woes, by the way, that have been artificially created by the very self-same greedy people who think they deserve more than others because they steal more than others.

Whenever I write this kind of thing, I get push-back about how the rich pay the most taxes, so how is that fair? Yes, the rich pay most of the taxes, on a dollar-for-dollar basis, but they control the vast majority of the wealth. They SHOULD pay the most taxes. Just looking at the hard-dollar amount they pay is insufficient information. One needs to consider the rate they extract and the percentage of wealth they control.

Here’s a fact: high taxes on high incomes causes the wealthy to actually do that which they pretend low taxes might someday encourage them to do…

President-non-elect Musk And His Puppet…

by MyBaconPress

By Wednesday, MAGA Mike the Johnson had come to an agreement to keep the government open. It was just a continuing resolution (CR). MAGAGOPCORP, Inc can’t pass an actual budget. (That’s hard!) Still, it was a deal. The government would keep functioning. BUT…

President-non-elect Musk ordered his pet, puppet-elect Trump, to shut down the CR – and Trump did as he was ordered. Let me repeat that: Trump told the House to shut down the CR because Musk told him to. Okay, so, first, I’m feeling for MAGA, right now. You’all voted for Trump because you thought he would do a good job. Hell, I’d bet you thought HE was going to DO the job. But you GOT Musk. On the left, we’re disappointed we didn’t get our candidate. MAGA should be disappointed they didn’t get their candidate, either.

Obviously, team Trump is out already, trying to reinforce the idea that Trump isn’t taking orders from Muck, immediately after Trump obeyed an order from Musk. It’s a hard thing to sell right after so publicly doing the thing you claim you’re not doing. Musk orders Trump to kill the bill, Trump kills the bill, then Trump insists he doesn’t take orders from Musk.

Musk tried to maintain the cover as well. “Oh, shucks, I’m just pointing things out,” is a paraphrase of his words. “If Trump does as he’s told, well, that’s his choice.” Uh-huh. And if Trump doesn’t do as he’s told? Stay tuned. Eventually, Trump will forget he’s supposed to bend the knee to Musk and he’ll do something off-script.

Trump says he’s okay if the government shuts down. Trump says if the government is going to shut down, it should happen while Biden is still in office and not him. Trump thinks, get this, that Musk can order Trump to kill the CR – which he does, the Republicans in Congress dutifully obey, and Americans and even MAGA will think it has something to do with Biden? Americans aren’t that stupid. Is MAGA?

This threat is being reported even in MAGA media. Now, to be sure, MAGA media is claiming it’s because Democrats won’t agree to the sudden, newly re-written agreement. Democrats were good with the first agreement. THAT’S the one they’ll sign on to. But this shut down is clearly happening because Musk made a call, Trump followed instructions, and the GOP in Congress obeyed, regardless of the fallout. It doesn’t really matter who is sitting in the Oval Office today. Everybody knows, Musk called for it, Trump endorsed it, the GOP in Congress DID it. Sure, blame Biden…

Of course, shutting down the government won’t have any effect on the billionaires forcing the shutdown. They have plenty of money. They’ll be fine. Millionaires will be fine as well. SO…are you a millionaire or a billionaire? No? Well, your “savior” is turning his back on you right now, because Musk told him to. He’s not even President yet. (And I’m not even sure which one of them I mean.)

Cons and the corporate media are going to work overtime to try to convince the world that the shutdown is the Democrat’s fault. But it isn’t. The Democrats made a deal. They were on board. The government would have stayed open. The Republicans balked and walked away – because Musk ordered it.

Do you remember when the left started saying about the right, “Hey, that looks like fascism!” and the right pretended to get all upset and “offended?” “Oh,” they said, “we HAD to vote for Trump because you said we were acting like fascists.” Uh-huh. It turns out, the House of Representatives taking orders directly from a not-elected, not-appointed billionaire is pretty much the definition of fascism. Oh, and I don’t CARE if you’re “offended.”

A government shutdown just before Christmas? That probably won’t harm the economy at all, right? I mean, how could it hurt? WHO could it hurt? But do you know what? Musk doesn’t care. Trump doesn’t care. Neither one of them will even feel it. MAGA rank and file? The vast majority of actual Americans? They may not be able to say the same.

UPDATE: At the last minute, the GOP went with the first deal. Well, there were a couple of minor changes but it was essentially the first deal, the one the Dems had already agreed to. The government stays open for now, much to the chagrin of incoming ruler Musk and his puppet Trump. I’ll tell you the truth, this is one of the last stopgaps we can hope for in the incoming insanity. It’s easy for Musk and Trump to insist upon harmful damage to everyone so they can benefit themselves, but asking Congress to inflict that damage willy-nilly might well result in some push-back.

Trump had demanded the removal of the debt ceiling. Do you remember when cons were dead set against ever raising the debt ceiling? Now, Trump KNOWS he plans to blow up the national budget and he NEEDS that debt ceiling gone – thus the demand. GOP passed the CR without removing the debt ceiling. I might put that this way: the first confrontation of the incoming Musk/Trump maladministration resulted in a resounding failure for the incoming Musk/Trump maladministration.

My, that’s an awful lot of chaos Musk and Trump caused, especially when one considers the total nothing they got out of it. I’d say this particular stance did more harm than good. It exposed Trump as beholden to Musk. It exposed Trump AND Musk as completely indifferent – perhaps hostile – to the needs of the American people. It introduced instability to economic markets for no reason at all.

Merry Christmas, MAGA. It looks like you’re getting what you voted for…

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Okay, so economic rule number one is this: the Dow Jones Index (there’s no such thing as the Dow Jones Industrial Average anymore) is NOT the economy. I tend to think of it as a CEO happiness index. When CEOs are happy, like they have been under Biden, the Dow goes up, just like it has been under Biden – to record levels, in fact.

When CEO’s are worried about something or outright unhappy? Well, the Dow goes down. Have you noticed, yet, that each day we get closer to Trump taking over, the Dow is going down? TEN straight days, the Dow has ended down. On the 17th of this month, the Dow lost 1,123 points. That was just ONE DAY! Friday, finally, there was a little bargain hunting and the Dow recovered a small amount, preventing a record one-week falloff.

When the Dow is doing well, you see it in a little box in the corner of your television screen on every local news program. You don’t see it right now, though, do you? It magically disappears when the Dow is tumbling. CEO’s don’t seem happy with Trump’s plans and that concern is being reflected in the Dow. But, hey, drones over New Jersey, right?

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As it happens, the decline of America has coincided perfectly with the rise of right wing media. It might be comforting to know that right wing media has not ONLY infected America. It’s on the rise in Europe, too, and suddenly, the far right is having a heyday there, as well.
“Why would that be comforting?”
“Yeah, I guess that was a poor choice of words. How about ‘informative?'”
Whichever. Either way, it turns out propaganda works very well and a huge swath of gullible people are falling for it here AND abroad.

It ALSO turns out that President non-elect Musk is intruding in German politics as well as American politics. Musk is exposing himself – which makes him a hero to cons. No, I mean he’s exposing himself AS a far-right nutball con. Musk IS the meddlesome funding king of the right the cons always pretend George Soros is on the left.

So, Germany is angry at Musk, right now. Musk has tried to include himself in their functions by supporting far right political group, ‘Alternative für Deutschland’ (AfD). In Musk’s opinion, “only the AfD can save Germany.” In some ways, the fact that Germany is fighting off a far-right, fascist movement concerns me more than the same fight we’re fighting here, in America.

Germany has experience with this already. Their experience was NOT good. They effing KNOW better! But the propaganda works very well. As the saying goes, a lie will get halfway around the world before the truth can get it’s shoes on. (It’s commonly attributed to Mark Twain but may not actually be his…) It doesn’t matter who said it first, it’s correct. Stack lie upon lie upon lie, like the far-right media does, and one gets lost in the lies and it’s very hard to get out.

Musk interfering with Germany AND the United States at the same time? Inconceivable! Oh, here’s a probably completely unrelated thing that has nothing to do with anything. Tesla is currently recalling over 700,000 of their god-awful, death-trap ‘Cybertrucks.’ Their motto? ‘The Tesla Cybertruck: for when even the biggest pickup won’t compensate for your tiny, tiny penis.’ Perhaps the Tesla CEO should pay more attention to his company and spend less time chiming in on politics he clearly doesn’t understand. (The very worst thing that can happen to a rich person is when they start believing their own hype. They’re not geniuses. They’re thieves. Nothing more, nothing less…)

Phantasms…

by MyBaconPress

Oh, those wacky Dems. Every once in a while, they get attached to a candidate and then push that person, even though that person’s record is one of losing. I remember it with that guy in Texas, Beto O’Rourke. He did manage to get elected to the House, but in 2018, he decided to run for Senate. He ran a good race, but he lost. He didn’t lose by much, though, so we had to endure a period of the Dems telling us what a competitor he is. Then they kept running him for things, because he only loses by a little. After losing for Senate, he ran for President because that makes sense. Nope, lost there. So, he ran for governor of Texas. Ooh, just missed the goal and, well, lost again. It was close, but he lost.

The Dems celebrated the losses because they weren’t resounding defeats – just a close losses. In MY mind, a loss is a loss and close doesn’t matter. You don’t get consideration for losing, whether by one point or a hundred. So now, the Dems are floating the idea of trying Kamala again in 2028. First, how cute, thinking there’s going to be an honest election in 2028. I’m glad they’re preparing for the possibility, but I don’t think the country has yet internalized the depth of corruption that has infected this once-great nation.

But second? How does losing prove you’re the one to carry the banner? I like Kamala. I thought she ran an okay race. I don’t think her lack of time was as big of a factor as some would have you believe. I voted for her. But it wasn’t her first run for President so it wasn’t the first time she has lost a race for President.

Oh, AND – she effing lost to Donald Trump. (In fairness, I believe the “election” was stolen through chicanery, but, officially, she still lost.) I’d like to propose a New Rule: anybody who loses to Trump MUST leave politics immediately. If you can’t beat Trump, how bad of a candidate are you?

C’mon Dems. Try Gavin, or some other Dem from a large state you haven’t tried, yet. Younger, fresher faces are far more appealing. We’ve SEEN the Democratic establishment and we find it kind of “ho-hum.” Either way, it’s STILL a fools errand to think there will be a fair election in 2028. Now that the cons have perfected the art of stealing elections (likely with Putin’s help) why wouldn’t they do that from now on?

Besides, under any circumstances, the only thing that gets Trump to leave office is his death. No, that’s not a threat, nor an invitation to violence. Trump managed to slither out of his Federal charges but he is still on the hook for state charges. New York is either going to sentence him for his 34 felonies, with the sentence to be served after he leaves office (so he won’t), or they’re going to delay sentencing until after this term (so it will never end). The hamburgers have to get the guy because the law certainly won’t.

I think he benefits from that obvious advantage to being the antichrist…

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I feel like we’re all being led around by our noses by the One-Percent-serving, corporate media. Specifically, we’re hearing a LOT – tons and tons – about things Trump intends to do once he re-infests the Oval Office. Some of the threats come directly from Trump, himself, some from surrogates.

Each time a new desecration is promised, Americans react – along with the rest of the world. I’ve started to suspect that’s the goal: outrage exhaustion. We, on the left are NOT MAGA. We haven’t been conditioned to get furious on cue and STAY angry. We’re not practiced at ginning up faux outrage – and REAL outrage just makes a person tired all over. It’s hard. So here come the flood of threats from the incoming maladministration – and, right on cue, here comes the outrage.

How about if we hold our outrage for the things he actually tries to do?

Look, he’s going to do some damage. There’s no avoiding that. But will it be the clean sweep, the scorched Earth policies he’s promising? I’m not so sure. For one thing, he’s a moron and he’s surrounding himself with morons. As we all know, even a stopped clock is right twice a day – a phrase losing it’s meaning as we lose analog clocks. They’re going to succeed in some things, like tax cuts for the rich. They ALL agree on that one and they collectively don’t CARE about the damage those cuts will do. But they’re bound to lose their way to simple incompetence in other efforts.

For another thing, Trump may never have to run again, but Congress critters do. They’re going to be concerned with their political future. Again, some of the dumber ideological positions WILL carry forward – I don’t pretend this isn’t going to suck. But I’m less certain that Congress critters are going to end their own careers in favor of Trump. Even with Muck out there threatening them with his stolen lucre, their actual choice is to certainly lose because they screwed their own constituents or maybe lose because Musk financed an opponent. One might as well try to do the right thing in that situation, yes?

A third, possible help, is that the cons didn’t get the huge majority they need to simply steamroll their way through legislation. In the House, the Dems need only 2 cons to join them to block many announced, planned evils. Although the One Percent have seized power in most areas of government, there are still some decent Republicans, more interested in doing the right thing than appeasing the mad king.

Finally, on the side of hope, there’s genuine outrage. There are masses in the streets. There’s push-back from millions of people, probably as they find themselves in the crosshairs of some Trumpian dysphoria.

It seems clear he’s going to do damage, we all know it. We’re all on edge about it, worried and wondering. But it’s a waste of time and energy to react to every shadow on the wall. I’ll tell you this: It makes more sense, to me, to react to actual threats as they unfold, rather than the specter of threats as they’re announced…

A Proposal I Can Get Behind…

by MyBaconPress

Trump and his people are floating the idea that they might eliminate Daylight Saving Time and keep the country on standard time. That’s a good idea, if you ask me, but someone at ‘The New Republic’ doesn’t like it at all. I just read this sentence from one of their articles: “His promise would make Standard Time, which we are currently in and which people overwhelmingly hate due to the increased darkness, permanent.”

So, how stupid is that? I hate to break it to the writer, but the “increased darkness” she’s experiencing is because it’s late fall and nearly winter. See, the days get shorter and shorter in North America (therefore, ‘darker’) because of Earth’s angle relative to the position of the sun. Then, on one very special day we call the ‘Winter Solstice,’ the days start getting longer again – because the angle of the Earth relative to the sun shifts a bit. It happens that way EVERY SINGLE YEAR and will continue to do so long after humanity has wiped itself off the planet. It has nothing to do with clocks. It turns out, if we don’t change our clocks, the days will get longer anyway.

That’s the kind of ignorance people are up against, these days. Changing the clocks twice a year is just stupid and dangerous. It serves no functional purpose. Oh, and leaving the clocks on Daylight Saving Time year round actually kills people. That’s not a theory. The US tried it once, in 1973. We set up a two year program and left the clocks on Daylight Saving Time. So many people died – kids, mostly – the program was cancelled after the first year.

But that was leaving the clocks permanently on Daylight Saving Time. (It made it too dark for kids to safely walk to school or the bus stop so moms started driving their kids to school. So much for saving energy, which it doesn’t do, anyway.) Trump is proposing to leave the clock on Standard Time – and that’s a proposal I can get behind…

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One of the things MAGA has long-since been conditioned to gripe about is all the people who work in government who weren’t elected. I don’t mean the day-to-day functionaries, though they bitch about them, too. I’m talking about, for example, the so-called “Czars” (or Tsars or Tzars. We probably should have asked them how to spell it before we eliminated them.)

These are high-ranking, high-profile political appointees put into position by an elected official, but they’re not elected themselves. Right up until this last “election,” MAGA has known, without question, they hate, hate, HATE the czars – specifically because they’re high-powered appointees who were NOT elected by the people.

It’s just a wild, random guess, mind you, but I’m thinking that, suddenly, now that Trump is appointing Czars, MAGA is going to be on board – every one of them. Yay, let’s hear it for high-ranking, high-powered, not-elected appointees!

MAGA is a very easily manipulated, re-directed group…

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I have to confess, I’m a little irritated that ABC has settled with Trump. Trump sued ABC because George Stephanopoulos said he (Trump) had been found liable for raping E. Jean Carroll. Technically, you see, Trump has only been found liable for sexually assaulting Ms. Carroll. The ruling didn’t include the word ‘rape.’

People didn’t start applying that word until the judge sitting in the case clarified that, yes, forcible penetration with one’s fingers is a form of rape. Nevertheless, ABC is going to pay $15 million dollars to the Trump museum/foundations AND air an apology for “mischaracterizing” the E. Jean Carroll verdict.

ABC didn’t have to pay. They could have relied on the Judge’s words to defend themselves. I suspect ABC settled because Trump is about to seize power and they’re afraid of what he can do to them from the Oval Office. That is to say, they KNOW he’s likely to abuse his power and they don’t want to be on the receiving end of it. Yeah, okay.

I’ll tell you this: the ONE thing we know, now, is that we shouldn’t trust ABC going forward. We KNOW they’ll tailor their “news” reporting to whatever makes the mad king happy – and that makes them an untrustworthy source…

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Man, you don’t see it very often and there’s a reason. A football player named De’Vondre Campbell was on the Forty Niners NFL team. The team needed him to go in and play. He said, “No.” Apparently, he was irritated that he had been demoted for a better player. When his number came up and he was called to play, his tantrum caused him to refuse – and then leave the field.

If there’s one thing the NFL won’t stand for, it’s a player who refuses to play. It takes a LOT to even get in to the NFL. Most of the players there are grateful for the opportunity. There’s another guy on the Niners, Fred Warner, playing with a fractured ankle, fercrissakes! Campbell won’t play because he feels slighted.

Campbell will be off the team as quickly as they can arrange it. I seriously doubt any other team in the NFL will pick him up. Campbell’s tantrum cost him what’s left of his career but, hey, maybe that’s the point. He has played for nine years and his game has dropped off. Maybe he’s done, anyway, and this was just a high-profile way to leave the league. Whatever he intended, it IS a high-profile way to leave the league. And don’t let the door hit you…

It’s the Free Market, Stupid…

by MyBaconPress

Capitalist: 1) An investor of capital in business, especially one having a major financial interest in an important enterprise. 2) A person of great wealth. Then, thrown in to try to keep the rest of us on board, 3) A supporter of capitalism. (Uh-huh…)

It’s one of the greatest deceptions of all time. Capitalists have their victims (that’s you and me) declaring themselves capitalists and defending capitalism. And we do, too. If you ask anybody in America, odds are they’ll tell you they’re a capitalist and they believe in capitalism. You can see that one of the definitions is ‘A supporter of capitalism.’ That makes us feel like we’re ‘on the team,’ as it were – but we really, really are not.

Those first two definitions – rich people who have major financial interests in important enterprises – are FAR more accurate descriptions of capitalists, but do you know what THAT means? That means that, far and away, most Americans are NOT capitalists. (We’re the victims of capitalism.) We’re not rich and we don’t own enough to have “major financial interests in important enterprises.” We just get up and go to work, creating the wealth the capitalists keep – and then use against us…

Suddenly, I feel a need to make this point. There are NOT only two systems, Capitalism or Communism. I don’t support communism, either. It clearly doesn’t work – based on the idea that it has never worked anywhere in the world, any time in history. But this so-called ‘Free Market Capitalism’ ain’t working so hot, either, wouldn’t you say?

I support the middle road, once known as New Deal Capitalism. I call it ‘Social Capitalism.’ The rest of the world calls it ‘Democratic Socialism.’ That’s too bad, too. Americans have been fully conditioned, brainwashed really, to believe that the word socialism describes one thing and one thing only: communism, so the instant they hear that word, many Americans crap their panties and dive for the covers to hide their heads. But despite the stupid name, it’s really just managed capitalism, the kind that fights back against capitalistic abuse. It’s better for everyone – even rich people.

Right now, the poster child for the failure of ‘Free Market Capitalism’ is Luigi Mangione, the guy who gunned down the current poster child for capitalistic abuse, Brian Thompson. Mangione shot Thompson in the back, just gunned him down in the street. As of this writing, it appears Mangione shot Thompson as a symbol. That is, he had no personal beef with Thompson. Thompson became the poster child of capitalistic abuse because he was the CEO of the health insurance company that denied more claims than any other company.

Nobody seems to care. I see memes out there of Luigi superimposed by Photoshop into various work environments with comments about how he was there on Dec 4, on-site all day and right next to other workers. Never out of their sight, even for a moment. Why, the memes insist, Luigi couldn’t have done it. Alibi established. Obviously, it isn’t. It turns out, the police have a few photos of their own – and theirs aren’t Photoshopped.

Truthfully, when the shooting occurred, my first thought was “Someone who got denied.” I wasn’t alone. I felt badly that I didn’t feel worse about the shooting. I felt guilty that I was kind of happy to see a little guy get even for a change. As it happens, I’m not alone in THAT, either. I expected the party to end a few days later, as people got past their bubbling anger and re-connected with their humanity. So far, that hasn’t happened. Instead, there’s a “Free Luigi” movement starting.

Do you know who IS showing signs of concern, though? Corporate media. The media owned and operated by the capitalists. The message coming from both sides of the dial is the same – it’s poor form to shoot capitalists. Don’t do it. That’s not working, either. I suspect we’ve all noticed that NONE of them are promising to change their ways. They just don’t want people shooting them for the abuses. But people are really angry and most of us seem quite happy that a rich guy got his, for a change. And that’s the key.

Thompson’s program of denial likely killed thousands. THAT was just “good business.” HE was getting bonuses for increasing the bottom line so nicely. Families were planning funerals that didn’t have to happen. We ALL know this. We ALL know we COULD have decent health care in this country. But the capitalists don’t WANT us to have decent health care. They can’t profit if they can’t insert themselves into the process and all they care about is profit.

So, after forty years of living the ‘Free Market Capitalism’ life, one guy has reached the point of shooting someone and the rest of us are cheering the act. There’s even a new movement out there called ‘Board rooms, not classrooms.’ It takes the position that, if you’re going to be a random shooter that goes out and kills someone for fame – at least kill someone whose death benefits society. Don’t kill six-year olds. Don’t shoot up classrooms. Kill CEO’s. Shoot up board rooms. Go out a hero, like Luigi. (I’m only describing, and not endorsing, the movement, here.)

I think Luigi was trying to start something and I think he has. Somehow, this single act of defiance has loosed a torrent of anger at the way our economy works (or doesn’t, in so many cases). I suspect Luigi wanted other people to start shooting right away. That part didn’t happen but the anger is now at the top, not being hidden anymore, perhaps bubbling over. In fact, it’s being celebrated. There WILL BE other shooters.

And now, just to put the icing on the cake, we’re getting the richest political Cabinet in history. We’re already hearing messages from billionaires like, “You Poors are going to have to suffer,” and comments about how Joe Six-pack has it way too easy. Trump has admitted, now, that he isn’t going to bring the price of groceries down and he can’t guarantee his tariffs won’t raise prices. “Yeah, I lied. Whaddaya gonna do about it?” Hey, ask Luigi.

Consider this: So-called “Free Market Capitalism” has created a world in which people cheer when a capitalist is gunned down in the street – and all the while, there have been entities in place pushing back against the abuses of the Free Market. Now, the One Percent (and Putin) have managed to install the richest group of people in history, none of whom have even the slightest idea of what life is like for a working person. Corruption has mostly eliminated the restraints the held them back in the past – even the recent past.

Now? The brakes are off. The capitalists – the true capitalists, not the “supporters of capitalism” – are about to have their way with the economy without restraint. Do you think that’s going to be better or worse for the Small Folk? If we’re already at, “Yes, kill them!” and the capitalists are about to turn the screws even harder – and I guarantee they are – I expect blood.

To be clear, I don’t WANT blood. I wish every self-absorbed, self-serving, self-described “important” blowhard would get visits from three ghosts and see the error of their ways. But John Kennedy’s words are about to explode in front of us. The capitalists are making violent revolution inevitable…

#FAFO…

by MyBaconPress

Hey, didn’t Donald promise, over and over and over again, that he would NOT touch Social Security? Didn’t he promise, over and over and over again that he wouldn’t raise the eligibility age by ONE DAY? He did. I know he did. There’s video of him making that exact promise at rally after rally. He promised! AND…doesn’t Donny ALWAYS keep his promises? That’s the MAGA story, anyway. But wait. What do we have, here?

Suddenly Trump and his billionaire buddies think your Social Security is WAY too high and, wait, what’s this? Yes, it needs to be cut. Billionaires are SURE you’re taking too much. How very selfish of you, taking payment on the insurance you paid into your whole working life. And now the billionaires are here, planning to put a stop to that.

Now that he’s taking office, Trump has also admitted that he can’t really do anything to bring down the price of eggs. Huh, whaddaya know? “It’s hard,” he says. He’s the first to tell you he “won on groceries.” Now he’s confessing he can’t do all that much about groceries, which means, of course, that he “won on lying about groceries.”

We’ve all heard, by now, the (admittedly anecdotal) stories of factories revoking or limiting expected Christmas bonuses because they have to use the money, instead, to prepare for the economic damage resulting from Trump’s promised tariffs. It turns out, the end users DO pay the increases, just like people tried to warn.

These things are all traveling together under a banner called #FAFO. Fair warning: the first ‘F’ in that is a generally accepted “bad” word, though I confess, it’s one of my favorites. FAFO stands for ‘Fuck Around and Find Out!’ Until very recently, it was most commonly tossed out by young, often intoxicated men looking to engage in a rousing round of fisticuffs.

It translates, roughly, to, “Oh, my goodness, if you continue on this apparent intended course, you might well discover some unforeseen and certainly unfavorable consequences to your actions.” There’s nothing tough about that, though, so they shorten it to ‘Fuck around and find out!’ The phrase has been co-opted by the left since the “election.”

I’m not sure how I feel about it. I don’t THINK it’s taunting. I wouldn’t like it if it was. I continue to believe the right has, more than anything, been deceived. I don’t think there’s any honor in taunting someone about being deceived. Anybody can be deceived.

It’s certainly not Schadenfreude. The left can’t take pleasure in the suffering of the right since the left will suffer the exact same consequences at the exact same time. Hell, it’s not even “pleasure.” ‘Satisfaction’ is probably a better word. It’s been pretty well established that cons have to live a thing to understand it.

I THINK it’s vindication, that is, proof that someone or something (in this case, the left) was right, reasonable, or justified. It’s GREAT to be vindicated, even when the vindicated person is going down with the ship as well. “I KNEW it wasn’t ‘unsinkable!'” Sure, he’s going to drown, too, but there’s a very brief moment where he gets to enjoy the satisfaction of having been correct – before the panic and desperation set in.

I think the left is just trying to make sure the right doesn’t miss the details of what their votes have wrought. It’s a matter of ‘don’t tell them they were mistaken, show them they were mistaken.’ These days, the only positives the left can see in the future will be watching the deer-in-the-headlights look on MAGA faces as they realize they “fucked around” – voted for Trump – and now they get to “find out” that Trump was lying to them all along.

This is pretty simple. The left used it’s knowledge and experience to politically scheme it’s way right out of power. Completely. There are just enough Dems left in Congress that they might – might – be able to stop some of the more egregious things, but they can’t enact anything. In short, anything that happens in the next couple of years lies directly at the feet of the GOP. They have nobody else to blame.

Sure, conservative media will try. They have to try. But the GOP has all the power. Eventually, even MAGA should be able to figure out that the people doing them so much harm are, in fact, the very Republicans they’ve been supporting. I suspect the left is going to KEEP pointing it out.

Here’s the thing, though. I don’t want the left to get smug or taunt the right. It’s one thing to show someone the error of their ways. It’s another to “punish” them. Remember all those arguments with Uncle MAGA? Remember how he would not back down from his positions no matter what evidence you provided? We’re going to need that tenacity on our team once they realize the left isn’t their enemy, the One Percent is. So let’s leave a door open that allows them to save a little face as they come back to reality…

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Well, bless their hearts. I mean, how sweet, like the innocence of a small child. According to CNN, Republicans in Congress are certain Trump has no plans to go around them in trying to reach his goals of cutting two TRILLION dollars from the budget. GOP Rep. Mark Amodei of Nevada, who serves on the House Appropriations Committee said, “We worked very hard to stay in the majority and get the majority in Congress. I’m sure that the ‘thank you’ for that is not, ‘we don’t need no stinking Congress.’” (Uh-huh…)

GOP Rep. Max Miller of Ohio, who claimed that all stakeholders involved want the same thing echoed, “They have no choice but to work with us, they have to.” (Heh, Heh…)

And GOP Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the incoming Senate Appropriations chairwoman for the next Congress – and ALWAYS an excellent judge of character and summarizer of situations -told CNN ahead of her one-on-one meeting with Musk, “To me, that violates the separation of powers.” (Ah—ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! )

Meanwhile, (you might want to sit down for this) Trump is laying the groundwork to see how much he can cut by going around Congress. He wants to use a process called ‘impoundment.’ It’s illegal, of course. See, Congress spends the money, not the President. When Congress allocates money for something, whether useful or stupid, that money goes where Congress allocated unless Congress acts again. That’s in the Constitution.

Trump has put a guy in place who thinks none of that matters. The guy is Russell Vought, co-author of Project 2025. You remember. That’s the project Trump swore he had never heard of and didn’t know the people behind it, even though many or most of them had worked in his previous maladministration. Vought thinks the President can just, on a whim, redirect money or refuse to spend it where Congress said, so long as he calls the practice some official sounding name, like ‘impoundment.’

It’s one of the many, many…okay, many battle shaping up within the GOP itself. The Congress critters ARE going to protect their own jobs. WHEN Trump tries to bypass them, they will assert their official roles, quite probably aggressively.

You see, Trump doesn’t give two figs about whether or not you ever see your Social Security. He has plenty of (your) money and he’ll be just fine. It’s the same with Musk and Ramaswamy. These are billionaires with NO IDEA of what life is like for normal folk. Worse, they don’t care. But the Congress Critters DO care. Not because they actually care, mind you, but because they want to keep their phony baloney jobs and keep raking in all that beautiful lucre.

Now, one does have to take into account that Musk has directly threatened Congress Critters who don’t do exactly as they’re told by Trump. He swears he’s going to use his glorious pile of ill-gotten money to attack any GOP member who defies Trump in the next “elections.” That kind of puts the GOP in Congress in a tough position: If they cut Social Security, or Medicaid, or the VA budget, or even welfare they’ll likely be voted out, anyway. If they don’t, Musk works against them.

That’s a lose-lose proposal from the incoming Trump maladministration. Congress must be SO excited to be in THAT position. But at the very least, if a threatened congress critter could go back and tell his constituents that he is being “primaried” because he insisted on protecting Social Security, I’d bet he would overcome Musk’s money. Maybe they’ll #FAFO…

Violations…

by MyBaconPress

It’s just such a weird feeling, being bummed police have captured a murderer. But I am. I’m not alone, either. The guy who shot the CEO of a health care denial company, we now know, is named Luigi Mangione. He was spotted at a McDonald’s Restaurant in Altoona, Pennsylvania and ratted out. Okay, turned in. Police showed up and arrested him.

Then, the Mickey D’s in question began to be bombarded with negative reviews. Google finally had to step in and remove the low ratings. The restaurant was being hit with bad reviews because that’s where Mangione was captured, not because of anything having to do with their business.

The corporate press is trying to trivialize the reality that people seem to support his Mangione’s actions. They’re calling him the “hot assassin” and pretending people only support him because of celebrity culture. They keep trying to reinforce the idea that shooting “important” people is a very bad idea.

This is just a guy with a beef who shot another guy. Murder, right? No, the CEO gets the honor of having been “assassinated.” ‘Assassinate’ is defined as murder for political or religious reasons. The corporate press wants the world to see the CEO as an innocent victim but the population, the people who deal with the fallout of the CEO’s leadership, keeps seeing the act as revenge – killing the man who killed so many.

The thing that strikes me about all of this is how the population isn’t letting itself be manipulated. We all KNOW murder is wrong. We’re not all sure this qualifies as a murder so much as an act of self-defense. I think the One Percent is about to start pressing very, very hard on the day-to-day workers, trying to extract whatever they can, however they can.

I think the population may well be far more angry about it than the One Percent have taken into account and I suspect there will be MORE vigilantes out there aiming for self-described “important” people. I think Mangione will go to jail, but I ALSO think it might take awhile to find a jury willing to convict…

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Effing Israel. Assad falls in Syria. The country is in a vulnerable moment, trying to determine what shape it’s going to take moving forward. But Israel saw an opportunity – and started bombing. Can you believe it? They say they’re just carving out a “buffer zone.” It’s one of their favorite stories, we need a buffer zone. I suspect the “buffer zone” Israel REALLY wants is one in which no Muslims can be found from the Mediterranean Sea to just beyond the Persian Gulf.

It’s a land grab, pure and simple. It’s kind of what Israel does, steal land. They’ve been doing it to the Palestinians for decades and now they see an opportunity to annex some of Syria and they didn’t waste ANY time.

Is this really behavior their god is going to protect?

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Yeah, this is dumb but here it is. I saw an article telling workers how they can plan a perfect “workation.” Get it? It’s a mashup. ‘Work’ and ‘vacation.’ See, you go on vacation, but you still work. Ooh, cute. Let’s mash that up and make it sound like something cool, working while on vacation. Yeah, workation, that’s the ticket.

Hey, you know what? Pound sand. If I’m on vacation, I’m not working. If I’m working, I’m not on vacation! This seems like an idea the One Percent is trying to inject into the populace and what a stupid, stupid idea it is. Besides, it comes out at a time when employers are demanding their employees return to the office. How the HELL do I go someplace restful (to not rest) AND show up at the office?

It reminds me of when the One Percent tried to convince people that working only as hard as people were being paid to work amounted to “quiet quitting.” Never forget, rich people literally used to work people to death. They worked children over the course of ten hour days. These guys, left to their own ends, will do ANYTHING for profits and they really don’t seem to understand worker’s reticence to be abused that way.

I doubt “workation” is something that’s going to catch on. I just wanted to mention it…

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Well, both sides ARE doing it. Joe Biden is commuting sentences of low-level criminals. The individuals in question did some real time, then got sent to home confinement because of Covid-19. They’ve BEEN on home confinement since and apparently there hasn’t been any problem. So, Biden just commuted many of their sentences (something like 1,500) in an effort to protect them from the incoming threat.

Meanwhile, in North Carolina, the Governor there is a Democrat but their state legislature is controlled by Republicans. So, the Republicans have voted to strip the Democratic governor of the state of most of his powers. Oh, and the incoming State Attorney General is a Democrat, too, so they stripped him of some of his powers, as well.

It’s a naked power grab. The thing is, the GOP is set to lose control over their legislation in the 2025 session so it may not be too serious of a move. When the Dems come in, maybe they can reverse the law.

The effing GOP is relentless in their thefts, power grabs, and hypocritical manipulations. Damn, I miss the days when people had honor…

Protecting Ones Self…

by MyBaconPress

It’s kind of wild, isn’t it? Watching the entire world, rushing to “Trump-proof” their area of responsibility is a little inspiring, a little sad. I don’t think they can do as much as they hope to do, but I’m glad people are trying.

I think the single most important factor Trump had last time was that nobody believed him. The idea that someone THAT undeveloped might have actually ascended to the highest office in the land was, simply, ludicrous. But the more the nation and the world interacted with this…guy…the more they understood: we need to protect ourselves.

I’m sure our allies are currently drying up back and forth communications, certain that any intelligence they share will end up in Putin’s control. Businesses are already trying to position themselves to survive the tariffs, if possible. Work-a-day Joes are just scared, mostly defenseless, wondering just how bad it’s going to be. Although, the recent, oddly celebrated shooting of the CEO of a “health care insurance” company has offered up a telling possibility.

The powers that are about to be at the top, should really take that shooting into account. It seems the American people really ARE angry at the way we’re being treated. It seems we may be more angry than many of us have presumed. It seems we may have less distance to revolt than I would have thought, anyway.

Americans KNOW we’re being Capitalistically abused in our quest for health care, for example. We KNOW it’s possible to create a better, not-for-profit system that provides superior care for FAR less money. Most developed nations have done exactly that. Yet, here, in the United States, the so-called Greatest Country On Earth™ can’t work it out. We simply cannot, for some reason, figure out a way to remove the leaches that have attached themselves to the system just to suck the life-blood of the desperate.

As the One Percent have succeeded, slowly but steadily, in reversing the benefits of the New Deal, life has become more and more expensive and it’s getting increasingly difficult just to keep up. And now there’s a crowd coming in that promises to make matters worse, not better. It’s an entire government BY the One Percent, FOR the One Percent and if there’s anything the One Percent do not understand, it’s the day to day challenges of NOT being in the One Percent.

The CEO of a health insurance company got shot and the country responded with a collective, “Good!” Not even a ho-hum. An actual, “Good!” That suggests an anger level much deeper than I had imagined. I mean, I know MAGA is angry. They’ve been angry about everything for as long as I can remember. It’s part and parcel to their operating system. But they’re usually angry about stupid things, made up offenses, imaginary threats, that kind of thing. Still, anger is anger and that shooting has kind of opened up my eyes.

I do believe the US is ripe for revolution. We KNOW the One Percent are having their way with us and we’re not much enjoying it. But we ALSO know that we’ve been a bit spoiled for quite some time. I’ve tended to discount how quickly the anger would bloom because I think people will put up with lots and lots of crap for a long, long time.

But we the people have been told we have to suffer for the bottom line for over forty years, now, and, perhaps, we’ve had it already. Now, here comes Trump to make sure we pay through the nose and suffer in new and more spectacular ways. But if the recent shooting is any indicator, they may want to slow their roll just a little bit. JFK seems to have been more prescient than I had guessed: violent revolution seems inevitable.

Note to the monitors: this is not a threat of any kind. I’m not calling for violence. I don’t want the violence. I’m simply acknowledging that I can see a path for it and wondering if the One Percent are seeing things the same way. (Sometimes, the rich and powerful misread the reality of the masses. Assad, anyone?) For clarity, it’s conjecture, not a threat…

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I’ve seen a lot of promises about all the various and sundry things Trump is going to do “on Day One.” I suspect Trump is going to play golf on day one. And day two. And day three. That pretty much defined his first maladministration. Why the hell wouldn’t it define the second? In order to do ALL the things he has promised to do “on Day One,” he would have to, wait, what’s that word he doesn’t know? Right, ‘work.’ He would have to work.

There are certain things I’m hoping for (counting on?) to help protect us from the threat of Trump, and his indolence is one of them…

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Nah, not buying. Whenever the gun argument heats up, gun rights advocates (GRAs) invariably mention that guns can’t go off by themselves. It’s a point of dogma for them: guns don’t go off by themselves.

Trump’s choice for Surgeon General, Dr. Janette Nesheiwat, shot her father in the head when she was just 13 years old. Well, that’s not her story. SHE says she was “looking for a pair of scissors kept in a tackle box on a shelf above her dad’s bed one early morning.” She accidentally knocked the tackle box off the shelf. It fell down and a .380 fell out of it, which then magically discharged, shooting her father in the head.

She wrote in a book about how she had to just sit and watch her father die but she never mentioned what killed him – her. The ‘New York Times’ had to go get the police report of the incident to discover the details. She got away with it. It was classified as a “tragic accident.”

Maybe it was, I don’t know. Then again, maybe Daddy never did THAT again. (I mean, why DO 13 year old girls shoot their father in the head?)

After Upheaval…

by MyBaconPress

I have to say, I didn’t really expect it. The Assad government in Syria seems to have fallen. This latest insurgence was fast and effective. Nobody is sure if Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian “President” (read: dictator) has actually fled the country or simply relocated to keep the fight going after Damascus fell.

On the one hand, Syrian army command informed officers on Sunday night the Assad regime had fallen. But the Syrian army ALSO said operations continue in certain areas of the country. Confusing.

Syria was seized by Hafez al-Assad in 1971 and he ruled through a vast “security” network. He used a broad network of detention centers and government surveillance. Apparently, most people in Syria know of someone who was “disappeared” by the government. Hafez then gave the government to his son in 2000 and he kept doing things people didn’t like until now. 24 years under Bashar, 53 years overall.

I hope the new government has a plan for the peace after the fighting. That seems to be the tricky part in running a revolution. How does one manage the peace after? The people there seem pretty happy about the fall, today. Here’s hoping it works out well for them…

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Speaking of dictators, I’m not sure why Trump went to the meeting with Presidents Macron of France and Zelenskyy of Ukraine in Paris. Is he trying to learn more about the conflict so he can make better decisions? How does that square with his obligation to Putin to do as he’s told, when he’s told?

Hope springs eternal, I guess. Zelenskyy is hoping he can penetrate a dull and closed mind a little bit and Trump wants to look “engaged” so he attends the meeting. But after the inauguration? My projection is that Trump will be parroting Putin and Ukraine will be in deep trouble.

Time will tell…

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I have a quick question about the Ethics Committee report on Matt Gaetz and his oh-so-perverted ways. Is it really necessary for anyone to see that report, now that the GOP has closed ranks and refused to release it? I mean, Gaetz stepped down from his cushy, phony-baloney job to keep that report from coming out, just as one would expect from someone who expected to be exonerated.
“Hey, we investigated whether or not one of ours was engaged in human trafficking by taking underage women across state lines for drug-fueled sex parties and then showed off photos of his “conquests” around on the House floor. We made a report.”
“Can we see the report?”
(If the report had cleared Gaetz:) “Sure. Here it is. It clears his name entirely!”
(Since it didn’t:) “Oh, we don’t release those reports. We keep all that stuff in a super-secret hidey-hole and there’s really no reason for anybody to see anything about it at all.”

There’s a reason the GOP always operates without evidence. Evidence always works against them. House members were complaining about Gaetz showing those photos before the investigation even began. We KNOW that part is true. So, if they were complaining about the photos Gaetz was showing off, is it so far of a leap to infer what the photos showed?

Their love of Trump has them actively protecting sexual predators. Gaetz wants to be Governor of Florida and he parrots the One Percent’s talking points perfectly. Why should a little sexual assault interfere with that? God, they must be so proud…

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If you’re looking at the NFC playoff picture, my Niners are listed as “on the bubble.” That means they have a far, FAR outside chance of making the playoffs. I doubt they’ll be making the playoffs. Practically speaking, the entire NFC West division would have to retire from football, en masse, for the Niners to have a realistic chance. They’ve had a tough season.

What can I say, we fans expected more. Hell, they were in the Super Bowl last year and they’ve been competitive most years since Kyle Shanahan got there. But this season, too many injuries to too many key players, combined with some really unimaginative coaching, terrible kicking, and team/player turnover proved too much. The team, essentially, collapsed.

They might beat the Bears today. The Bears are also a struggling team so it’s possible. But the rest of their schedule? I’m thinking, this season, the Niners go 6-11. That’s not good. I respect the way they’ve played through the adversity. I presume the team will be looking at the problems and addressing them in the off-season. The Niners are a good team. They’ve just had an unforgiving year with too many obstacles to overcome. I’m already looking forward to next season…