politics

MAGA Mad…

by MyBaconPress

Wow, the right is melting down over the change. Joe left. Kamala stepped in. MAGA is mad! They say it’s undemocratic. Is it, though? Does democracy mean someone is not allowed to change their minds? It’s important to remember, Joe was the “presumptive” nominee. He had not secured the nomination, yet. That’s the key. As of this writing, the Democrats don’t have a nominee. They have a presumptive nominee. We assume Kamala will be the nominee but that isn’t confirmed until the convention.

Mike Johnson said the switch was illegal in some states. Maybe Ohio, but they’ve already addressed that. Ohio has a law that the candidate must be named 90 days before the election but they’ve already issued a waiver. After that, though, there weren’t any specifics. There never are. Which law has been broken? Which states? Because those I’m hearing about refer to the nominee, not the presumptive nominee.

It looks, to me, like their actual concern is that now they’re running a geriatric patient (and in their case, a felon) against a younger, smarter, person. (A one-time prosecutor of felons.) Now Trump is the old guy who can’t complete sentences and needs help walking down ramps. MAGAGOP is now running the guy they thought (hoped) they were running against. And there’s no way in hell Trump would make as selfless a move for the good of the country as Biden made.

Both Biden AND Harris are running for lots of reasons. They want to help people who need help. Trump is running as a ploy to avoid prison. He HAS to stay in the race. Even if he had the integrity of Biden, he couldn’t step down – because of prison! I mean, that’s a real high-quality candidate, right there…

Besides, at this point, I’m not sure I want him to step down. The momentum is with the Dems right now. People on the left seem energized by the change. Trump saddled himself with effing JD Vance as his running mate. Remember all those things MAGAGOP keeps saying are illegal for Biden to have done? They aren’t, because he wasn’t the candidate. But those laws DO apply to Trump/Vance because they’ve been formally nominated.

So far, it looks like people find Vance just as vile and opportunistic as we find Trump. Maybe more so, if that’s possible. Vance was an excellent choice to needlessly shore up Trump’s already firmly dedicated base but Vance won’t do much to attract moderates, and MAGA can’t do it alone. They’ll need Russia, again, I guess. Fortunately for Trump, Putin is ready to help…

Remember when I mentioned that the cons plan to attack the way Kamala laughs? They’ve even done a montage reel. It’s supposed to be mocking. I didn’t really get the big deal, though. People laugh. She didn’t sound like Janice from ‘Friends.’ She just laughs. But, they needed something and they needed something fast – and that was the best they had.

But here’s the part that gets me. It came to my attention that MAGA isn’t the only group attacking the way Kamala laughs. Do you know who else took the exact same line? Russian state broadcasting. The attack on the way Kamala laughs is a pretty weak attack in the first place. The idea that both MAGA AND Russian broadcasting might come up with the same, very stupid attack doesn’t seem so much like a coincidence, to me.

To me, it seems Trump is working with the Russians again. You know, like he did before. Putin and Trump go back a long way. Putin’s daughter and Ivanka are friends, though they put the relationship on hold during Trump’s 2016 campaign. Putin helps Trump and Trump lets him. Of course Putin wants Trump to win. Putin wants access to the American intelligence apparatus again and the only way he gets it is if his spy gets back into the White House…

Like I said, that’s a real high-quality candidate, you got there…

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For reasons that elude me, the cons continue to attack Biden. I guess they’re just used to it. Like, they had all this good, vicious garbage they planned to spew and now they NEED to spew it, relevant or not. So they started attacking Biden’s ability to govern after he stepped down from the race. “If,” they ask, “Biden is too demented to be the candidate, isn’t he too demented to be the President?”

The thing is, he didn’t step down because he’s too demented to be the candidate. He stepped down because he had lost the faith of the people. He’s like a coach who has, for some reason, lost the locker room. It doesn’t matter, any more, that he’s a good coach. Once you lose the locker room, other factors come into play. Biden will be able to finish out his term just fine. But, hey, MAGA, you stay focused on Joe. Kamala will benefit from the distraction…

Thank You, Joe…

by MyBaconPress

Well, lets’ see, what to write about? I mean, has anything… Well, there’s this: Joe Biden has stepped aside as the Democratic nominee! Biden has been a very good President. If he was twenty years younger, nobody would have had anything to complain about. (Well, except MAGA. They make things up to complain about. They just like to complain.) Biden did the right thing for the country. He has created an opportunity for the Dems to win the election.

One of the reasons I like to write is that I can go back and see how often I’ve estimated correctly. It’s too easy for people to simply shift a position and decide that’s how they’ve always felt but when you write it down, you’re sort of committed to a given position, right or wrong. This one gets filed under ‘wrong.’ I really thought Joe was going to stay, for better or worse. Truth? My admiration for Joe just went up. A lot.

Don’t get me wrong, I like Joe. I’ve always liked Joe. He ran for President in 1988. I was thinking of voting for him, then, but he had to leave the race. He got caught up in a – and you can’t make this up – plagiarism scandal. Imagine that. He quoted a speech given by someone else without proper attribution – and had to stand down from the campaign! Standards, people!

Compare that to at least one of today’s candidates, the very old, cognitively impaired Donald Trump. Biden once had to stand down because of plagiarism. Trump is beloved by his base despite his crimes, failings, crimes, lies, crimes, outrageous claims, crimes, bullying, and crimes. Once, presidential candidates stood down over plagiarism. Now they can brag about groping women and issue openly racist diatribes and there are enough people who don’t care about any of it that they actually make excuses for him. “Ooh, he’s our guy!” Plagiarism, indeed.

Joe stepping down gave the left an immediate weapon against Trump: his age. Suddenly, the GOP is the party with the broken down old man suffering cognitive failures at it’s helm. The left pounced but the right does not, will not care. Equally as suddenly, the right simply decided that old and senile isn’t such a bad combination, after all. But the left will have fun doing to old, senile Trump what the right did to Biden, so…there’s that.

Biden kept insisting he was staying in the race. He would have, too, except for one key element. The Dems were perfectly prepared to totally ignore the desires of the rank and file. (When have they ever cared about the rank and file?) But when the money dried up? There was a pretty quick course change. I might have known. It’s always about the money in this submerging nation.
“Hey, Bob, millions of Democrats are distressed about Joe and feeling demoralized. They may not come out to vote. What are we going to do?”
“Say, Dan, why would we do anything? We’re the DNC! Joe Biden is our guy and they’ll vote for whoever we tell ’em to vote for, just like in 2016.”
“Um, we lost in 2016.”
“The point is, we didn’t let the voters push us around. WE call the shots. This is Joe Biden’s campaign to lose and we’re…”
“Yo, Bob, the big money donors are closing their wallets until Joe Biden is out.”
“Who? Joe who? No, name’s not familiar. Our candidate is Kamala Harris.”

Is Kamala the best choice? I don’t know. But she’s not the worst, of that I’m certain. She already has national name recognition. I think a lot of people will be excited to vote for her, in part because she’s a woman, in part because she’s a person of color (several colors, in her case). Mostly, because she’s younger (59 years) and more vigorous. She’s definitely in the ‘protect Roe’ mode. Most important of all? She’s not senile and there’s little risk of her becoming senile during the next four years. That, alone, gives her a huge edge over Trump.

I’ll ride with Kamala. I think she can do the job.

It’s funny. The first person I thought of after I’d heard the news was Gavin Newsom. Gavin has been running a shadow campaign. (He denies this.) He was all set to go in 2028. Now, with Kamala being pushed up, Gavin is being shut out until at least 2032, should she win. (If she loses, of course, we’ll be done with elections in this country. Trump will never leave.) That means Gavin wouldn’t get the nod until he’s 64. What does he do in the meantime to keep his name in people’s minds? Oh, well. That’s a different problem for a different day.

Meanwhile, Trump is in full attack mode. Of course, he’s still attacking Joe. After the announcement, Trump said Joe was a threat to democracy. (Trump, projecting.) Trump attacked Biden’s mental competence again. (Trump, projecting.) Tell you what, Donald, we won’t run Biden, how’s that?

I hear they DO have a plan to attack Kamala. They’re going to pick on the way she laughs. (That’s true.) They’re going to try to tie her to the border problem nobody has been able to solve (despite lying claims to the contrary) and which the GOP specifically sabotaged. They’re going to shift their blame for corporate greed from Biden to Harris – but it’s STILL just plain old, run-of-the-mill corporate greed.

It still doesn’t matter. Trump is still Trump, the same old (VERY OLD) criminal, sexual molesting, anti-American, democracy hating, lying, self-serving blowhard he’s always been. People STILL want a viable alternative to the same old (VERY OLD), same old and Kamala gives them that. Now, Americans can vote with confidence against very old, senile Trump. It’s a good thing. Thank you, Joe. The nation, along with the rest of the world, appreciates your sacrifice. You did the right thing – something Trump would never, ever do…

Do Not Go Gentle…

by MyBaconPress

There are people who are upset that Biden may step aside, concerned that the Dems have no one else who can beat Trump. I know one thing, Biden isn’t going to beat Trump. Yes, he’s had a successful administration. But his age is an insurmountable issue and unless you can find the Fountain of Youth, that issue isn’t going away. It’s true, the Dems may not have anyone who can beat Trump. But Biden is surely NOT going to beat Trump. So, we lose for sure or change horses and maybe lose. Which do you prefer?

Besides, I don’t think Biden ever beat Trump to begin with. No, I believe the outcome of the 202o election, but I think people were voting against Trump, not for Biden. Dems are desperately hoping people will come out against Trump again but the enthusiasm just doesn’t seem to be there. We’re not currently in the throes of a pandemic that was SO mismanaged it killed over a million Americans and I fear Roe has receded in people’s minds. Women in blue states know they can still get required services and women in Red states may be able to travel.

But the GOP wants to impose a nationwide ban on abortion and, likely, birth control. Of COURSE they’ll tell you differently. Cons lie all the time. They KNOW their program is not popular so they have to bring it in secret. Ignore what they say. Pay attention to what they do. Once Trump is in, though, he’s IN. Only death will remove him, so his unpopular agenda will move forward, like it or not. That’s the weird part. People WANT to vote against Trump but Biden’s presence on the ticket is killing enthusiasm.

I think Biden is killing his legacy by staying in the race. I wonder if he knows how much people will revile him when he loses, knowing everyone wanted him to step down but HE wanted HE wanted and screw everyone else. HE says if he loses, he’ll be okay with that if he just ran a good race. But staying in the race doesn’t just hand it to Trump, it hands the country over to the One Percent, once and for all. If you believe Project 2025, it ends the Republic as we know it…

Wow. That’s some real ‘hair-on-fire’ stuff, isn’t it? Do you know what’s funny about it? It doesn’t matter. Some of us already know the cons have a plan to just steal the election in January if Trump doesn’t win it outright in November. I’m sometimes told that’s paranoid hyperbole. Do you remember Merrick Garland and his appointment to the Supreme Court? No, because the seat was stolen, outright. Neil Gorsuch stole it. (Moscow Mitch did the work. Gorsuch ended up with the seat.)

Why would they have ANY compunction about doing it again, especially for such a prize? What a Dem win in November MIGHT do is light a fire under the butts of the left and get them into the streets when MAGAGOP makes it’s evil move. There’s either going to be some France-style social unrest at the theft, or we’re all just going to go gentle into that good night. I wonder if there’s any revolutionary spirit left in Americans…

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Remember Bob Menendez, the Democratic Senator from New Jersey who was accused of accepting bribes in exchange for his influence in certain legal matters? He blamed his wife. He insisted he didn’t know anything about it. He said he was innocent. A jury said otherwise. It’s almost as if high-profile people ALWAYS claim to be innocent of the crimes they commit. Think Donald Trump.

Now he says he’s confident he’ll win on appeal. I’m confident there won’t even BE an appeal. It’s just what they say…

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On the left, people are shaking their heads at the complete and utter turnaround of the “Never Trump” cons to full-on MAGA. Nikki Haley said a LOT of anti-Trump things and she was right when she said them. A few days before her South Carolina primary, for example, she questioned his mental competency. “Trump and Biden are two old men who are only getting older,” she said. “We’ve all seen them fumble their words and get confused about world leaders. That’s not who you want in the Oval Office when Russia launches a nuclear weapon at our satellites or China shuts down our electricity grid.”

She said Trump had brought chaos to the GOP. She remained defiant and in a fighting spirit. “I feel no need to kiss the ring. I have no fear of Trump’s retribution. I’m not looking for anything from him,” she added. “My own political future is of zero concern. So I hear what the political class says. But I hear from the American people, too.”

Now? Oh, she’s all-in. “…for the sake of our nation, we have to go with Donald Trump.” Yeah, that makes sense. He’s mentally unfit and thrives on chaos so he should be running the show for the good of the country. Oh-kay…

JD Vance was a firm anti-Trumper who has now transitioned so completely into MAGA, he’s Trump’s effing vice-presidential running mate. During 2016, he wrote in a letter to a friend, “I go back and forth between thinking Trump is a cynical asshole like Nixon who wouldn’t be that bad (and might even prove useful) or that he’s America’s Hitler. How’s that for discouraging?”

He said he thought Trump was “…the most-raw expression of a massive finger pointed at other people.” In social media posts, he called Trump “reprehensible” and an “idiot.” Now he doesn’t seem to remember any of that. He has even deleted the critical posts.

These two Trump critics (and others) have one thing in common: they’re politicians. If you want to know why so many Never-Trumpers are suddenly all in on Trump, do what Mark Felt (aka, ‘Deep Throat’) told Woodward and Bernstein during the Watergate investigation: follow the money.

Trump put his daughter-in-law in charge of the RNC. She (and, therefore, he) controls the money. Politicians need money to run. It’s how the parties control candidates. What, you thought Dems just collectively chose not to run against Biden? No money, no political future. So? Bend the knee. Kiss the ring. HAVE a political future. No? Get a real job, you’re out of politics. It’s simple, straight-up control – and they’re all doing as they’re told. Good dogs…

It’s a little micro look at what the entire nation is going to look like, here in the near future as Project 2025 rolls out. Everyone will be loyal to Trump – or else.

Threats, Real and Not…

by MyBaconPress

It turns out, I know why the right thinks the left incites violence. At least, I know their story. They know it’s really the right that incites most of the violence but they have to keep the lie going, so they do. Their story is, the left incites violence by saying Trump will usher in Fascism, comparing Trump to Hitler, and insisting he’s an existential threat to democracy.

It’s weird, isn’t it? When the right says all Democrats are existential threats to democracy, that, somehow, is NOT an inciting threat. But when the left says Trump is an existential threat to democracy, suddenly, that’s an unforgivable incitement to violence? If you’re curious about which side actually represents an existential threat to democracy, I’d look at the team that has a 900+ page plan to dismantle democracy.

Okay, technically, Trump won’t be ushering in Fascism. The United States has been a fascist state since the Kangaroos egregious Citizens United ruling which silenced average people’s voices and allowed rich people – and ONLY rich people – to own and operate their government. Trump is just going to consolidate that power and sprinkle in the authoritarianism – all while gutting the treasury and stuffing his pockets.

Is it fair to compare Trump to Hitler? That depends. If the subject is language spoken or which country was corrupted by evil, sure, there’s no comparison. Hitler spoke German. Trump speaks gibberish. Hitler corrupted Germany. Trump corrupted the United States. No comparison. But…

If one looks at the “playbook” the two men used in order to rise to power? Trump’s plan is VERY “Mein Kampf.”
Pick a group to “blame” and lay all of the nation’s problems at their feet. It was the Jews for Hitler. It’s brown people for Trump.
Make SURE the base knows the “threat” the “scary” people represent.
Attack journalism as “fake news.”
Lie so much people start losing the ability to discern truth from fiction.
Keep your supporters angry and scared, no matter what.
Tell your base they’re special and everyone else is out to get them.
Tell your team YOU are the only one “strong enough” to fix the problem.
Promise to fix ALL the problems with easy, simplistic answers but never offer details.
Lie, lie, and lie again. Then lie some more.

If someone exposes some of the…let’s say, darker portions of your intentions, deny it. (Project 2025, anyone?) Lie about it. Downplay it. Sure, trump will SAY he’s pro-America and wants to make America great. But what he DOES and what he says are generally NOT the same. Only time will prove the deception. History now has a clue on offer with Germany’s experience with Hitler, but one has to know history for that to matter.

So, for clarity, the comments that Trump will formally bring us Fascism, is like Hitler, and intends to dismantle our Republic are NOT “inciting calls for violence.” They are simple recitations of things the left understands from the evidence. In other words, facts. Cons hate facts. I’ve just explained why we think the things we think. They’re not conspiracy theories or scare stories. They’re factually accurate. Project 2025 is a fact. I can hold the plan in my hands.

But, the cons insist the comments are incitements to violence. Okay, so here’s the thing. Projection much? It’s just simple human nature that people have a tendency to project their own perceptions to a situation where space exists for it. I mean, let’s agree, shall we, that each of those comments has a spoken part and an unspoken part. Let us further agree that the unspoken part is a call to action of some kind.

When a lefty hears “Trump is an existential threat to democracy,” the spoken part, they fill in the unspoken part with their understanding of what it should be: “…so don’t vote for him.” That’s it. Don’t vote for him. That doesn’t seem violent at all. Cons do the same thing. They fill in the blank, too, but they use their own perception. Cons hear, “…so kill him.” Of course they see those comments as calls to violence. It’s how they see the world.

I’ll tell you this: The very fact that cons hear violence in left-leaning summations of our current situation betrays their allegiance to the very violence they pretend to abhor…

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All Musk’s X’s are moving to Texas. He says he’s taking his Space-X program and his dwindling web site and moving them to Texas. Well, their headquarters, anyway. Thanks, in large part, to subsidies he received from California, he has billions in infrastructure invested in Southern California. Is he going to just walk away from all of that because he’s having a tantrum? (He doesn’t like a law Newsom signed.)

If he moves everything, lock, stock, and barrel, it would harm California, I suspect. But if it’s just the headquarters? That will open up a few parking spaces in San Francisco and Los Angeles. Generally speaking, there aren’t enough people working in a headquarters to generate much impact.

Then again, maybe he moves nothing at all. It’s one thing to announce a move. It’s another to actually do it. It’s expensive. When he’s done, they have to live in Texas. (They don’t. Moving the technical location doesn’t mean they have to physically move at all but then, what’s the point?) I’ve lived in Texas. It doesn’t suck. There are a lot of things I like about Texas but the weather isn’t one of them. It’s miserably humid there.

Meanwhile, Musk says he’s giving $45 million to the Trump campaign every month until the election. To me, that’s stupid money. Because the Dems prefer to lose, the election is already over. We all know it. That’s why the country has fallen into the miasma we have. So why donate to a campaign that has only to show up on election day? (Oh, yeah, more of that ‘rich guy getting into the good graces of the dictator’ stuff…)

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I just want to say this: American pseudo-Christians are running around saying God saved Trump’s life in the shooting. Here’s the rule: if you believe in the Christian God, you must also accept the Christian God’s counterpart, Satan, who, apparently, sports a few metaphysical powers of his own. Quick question, why would God save the physical manifestation of the Seven Deadly Sins? More importantly, why would Satan NOT save him?

No, if there was some theological intervention on Trump’s behalf, it came from Satan, not God…

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Hey, speaking of Satan, one of the Deceivers died! Lou Dobbs has gone on to his reward. Or, in his case, his eternal punishment. One reaps as they sow. The world is better off without him…

A person the world is decidedly NOT better off without is Bob Newhart, who also passed this last week. He was a funny man. He did one of the best TV shows on the air in the 1970’s and then had another hit show in the 80’s. The finale of the second show had Bob waking up in bed next to his sit-com wife from his FIRST show. It was a brilliant callback to a device they had used regularly in the first series, an in-joke for his long-term fans. A joke at least ten years in the making. I laughed for several days. Really, genius. I’m sorry he’s gone.

Misrepresentations From The Right…

by MyBaconPress

I’ve got two sentences buzzing around in my head. One is a line from a Paul Simon song, ‘The Boxer.’ The other is a comment from Ayn Rand, of all people. Here, let me put them side by side for you:
‘A man hears what he wants to hear and he disregards the rest…’ (Simon)
‘You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality.’ (Rand)

I think those two sentences go together quite well to form a near-perfect warning. We’re about to enter what will likely be an ugly period brought on by people who chose to hear what they wanted to hear while disregarding the rest. Then, and only then, everyone will get to see, feel, and live the consequences of avoiding reality. There won’t be anything anyone can do about it.

MAGA is openly gleeful about it. They’re about to win and they know it. If I was excited about the end of our country, I’d probably be gleeful, too. But I’m not. History has already shown those of us who were paying attention where we’re headed. Most of MAGAS excitement is based on a reality that never existed and never will. They’ve been living in a world of illusion, brought to them by internet-based MAGA media that never hesitates to lie to them.

Do you know they think the LEFT has been responsible for the rise in violent rhetoric and actions in this country? The LEFT! It’s easy, see, if one just ignores, well, reality. Only one presidential candidate told his followers to “Knock the crap out of protestors,” promising to pay their legal bills (until he withdrew that promise). That was Trump during his 2016 campaign and political violence has been increasing steadily ever since, according to people who study such things.

The right planned to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer. The right made jokes when Paul Pelosi was smashed in the head with a hammer. One of theirs intentionally crashed his car into a crowd, killing one and injuring several at Charlottesville, the ‘Unite the Right’ rally. We all watch whenever there is some headline grabbing shooting, waiting to hear which team THIS crazy comes from. By a wide margin, the crazies come from the right. So? The right lies. ‘When the truth doesn’t work for you, ignore the truth.’ What a stupid mantra.

Oh, yeah. J6. The right pretends it was just an unauthorized tour, a peaceful gathering so they simply don’t count it as political violence. The rest of us saw the video and believe in reality. According to Reuters, since the documented violence of J6, “Of the 14 fatal political attacks since the Capitol riot in which the perpetrator or suspect had a clear partisan leaning, 13 were right-wing assailants. One was on the left.”

You know what? This is stupid. I could keep noting political crime after political crime, each attributable to right-wing ideology for a long time. The list is long. But thinking Americans already know the right is lying about who is responsible for the upsurge in these types of crimes and MAGA doesn’t care. I mean, they know, too. They just won’t admit it. And when they feel like they’re in a “safe space,” they’ll even make jokes about it.

I’ll tell you this: The right promoting and engaging in violence but pointing the finger at the left? Why, that’s classic MAGA. All they ever have to work with is lies. Ever. That’s okay with them. They’ll lie. The part that bothers me so much is how easily they’ve been deceived – and what it’s about to cost us all…

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OMG, have you SEEN the bandage? Look, I know Trump got hit by a bullet, but he wasn’t “shot” in the sense most Americans think about when thinking about “shot.” Trump is among the LEAST “shot” people who have been shot by crazies with guns. He was “grazed.” Yeah, his ear got cut. I’ve seen worse injuries from shaving nicks.

But Trump is playing it for all he’s worth. (I don’t blame him, mind you. He’s a politician.) He’s got a bandage on about the size of a postcard. It looks dumb as hell but the point of it is to BE seen. “Ooh, remember when he got shot?” Now MAGA is wearing similar bandages in “solidarity.”

I’m sure there was a smaller, less intrusive covering that could have been put over his owie. That’s what a man would do. He wouldn’t go looking for sympathy by highlighting the injury. I’m surprised Trump didn’t put on a florescent bandage that glows in the dark with blinking lights that spell out “shot.” I guess he couldn’t find one in time…

Terrible is Still Terrible…

by MyBaconPress

So, yesterday, I wrote about Trump getting winged. I speculated on possible reasons, since nobody knew anything substantial at the time I was writing. One of the possibilities I mentioned was that it was NOT a political hit. It was just another in a long line of MAGAGOP/NRA shootings in which crazy people compete with each other to try to get the most horrific mass shootings and stand atop the crazy shooter pile. It turns out, this was that.

MAGA thinks the Dems have to tone down the violent rhetoric, though. Yeah, cause Dems are the party of shooting beer to protest an ad they don’t like. Wait, is it the Dems who run political campaigns by shooting… anything they can think of that they relate to liberalism? No, that’s right. I mean, that’s THE right.

MAGA also thinks their god protected their guy. Apparently, their god didn’t give two figs about the others who got shot. Quick question, if god is out there protecting certain people from becoming victims, why does he allow innocent seven-year-olds to be cut to pieces but saves the life of the personification of the Seven Deadly Sins? I mean, which “god” are you people praying to? Because it seems to stink of Sulpher…

At least one guy suggested BIDEN should be arrested for attempting a political assassination. If he would tune in to reality for even a second, he would know that a) Biden had nothing to do with it and b) even if he had, Biden enjoys perfect immunity for official acts, thanks to the conservative Kangaroos on the way-high court.

All Biden would have to say is he was “testing the effectiveness of the Secret Service” as part of his official duties. You know, the same story Trump tells about his attempt to steal the election. Besides, if Biden was going to attempt an assassination, do you really think he’d send a poor shooting kid? Biden has access to the best snipers in the world, people who know how to account for windage. Why would he send that failed human being?

But, alas (because when does one get a chance to use ‘alas’) it was just a run-of-the-mill standard conservative nutball trying to make the record books…

So then the other question is, how is this going to affect the race? Did Trump just win? If anything, Trump won on debate night. I don’t think getting winged is going to offer him much, long-term. Sure, he’ll play it up as much as possible. (Be honest, Dems would, too.) MAGA will rend clothing and clutch pearls and swoon but now that we know the shooter was just a standard crazy doing MAGA-endorsed crazy stuff, we’re kind of back to normal.

I saw an article in the Guardian suggesting some of Biden’s talking points were now muted. I disagree. Trump is still an existential threat to democracy and to the health of America. Am I really not allowed to say so because of some conservative crazy? Are we on the left not allowed to mention the Trump inspired violence of J6 because of the MAGA enabled violence at ONE political rally?

Yeah, sure, MAGA is going to try to blame the left. MAGA always blames the left. MAGA has not proven itself a very well informed group. I can’t see standing down on facts because of one event. Especially when (with respect for those who were seriously hurt or killed) it’s a such a non-event for MAGA. The only one who counts for them is Trump – and he was only scraped.

Of course Trump will see a bump in his support. I hear shares of his struggling media venture have gone up in value. Polls might bump in his favor for a short time. But Trump is still who he is. He has still done what he has done. Having a bullet whiz past him isn’t going to change that and there’s still time to remind everyone of the threat.

As an example, on the same page where the Guardian is doing the inevitable post-shooting stuff, there’s an article from leading economists warning that Trump’s proposed economic plan is going to do FAR more harm to the US than not. One guy is even from the far-right conservative stink-tank American Enterprise Institute, so it’s not just lefties ripping on their opponent.

I have to confess, he DID get a pretty good photo out of it. He did. But he’ll plaster it on T-shirts and mugs and sell it for way too much money and the photo will become as hackneyed as his “never surrender” surrender photo. Yes, MAGA is going to get a little “chubby” every time they look at it but the rest of us?

Since, like everything, it was NOT what MAGA will say it was, to my mind, it’s already yesterday’s news. I don’t think people will jump aboard the crazy train because of a cool photograph and his policies still suck. Saying the shooting won Trump the election is like saying the shooting made women comfortable about losing bodily autonomy and that, maybe, rampant, outright racism isn’t so bad.

I’ll tell you this: Terrible is still terrible, cool photo or not…

A Republican Shot At Trump…

by MyBaconPress

I just finished a book called ‘Blink’ by Malcolm Gladwell. It takes the position that sometimes one’s first impression is far stronger, and more correct, than in-depth analysis and study. As strange as it is to say, based on that thinking, I feel like there is something amiss in yesterday’s “assassination attempt.” I can’t put my finger on it. It just doesn’t feel right.

There’s something about the angle that confuses me. As the shooting started, Trump’s head was turned nearly 90 degrees. That means the shooter had to be on the sides of event for the bullet to whizz past (or through) his ear. Otherwise, it would have gone into his head. The thing is, I didn’t see any buildings to the side of the rally in any of the photos. I’d like to see a better map of the area. I also thought the blood looked wrong – too red. But what the hell do I know about blood? Note: I’ve since seen a better map. The shooter was, in fact, to the side of event…

Like I say, it’s just a feeling and a bit of a paranoid one, at that. Did they stage a rally shooting that actually killed someone and seriously injured others just to boost Trump’s standing in the polls? No. That’s too cynical, even for me. I still can’t shake the feeling, though, that Trump wouldn’t hesitate to kill some “little person” he doesn’t even know if he thought it would win him the White House.

I know. It’s insane thinking. Then again, look at who this is about. Insanity, personified. Honestly, do you really think Trump is beyond staging a shooting and cutting his own ear for political advantage? I wish I could say, for sure, that he would never – but I can’t.

Then again, Trump likely won the election the night of that disastrous debate. He didn’t NEED to stage anything like this. Besides, will anybody vote for Trump just because someone tried to shoot him? I don’t think so. Trump is STILL an existential threat to the United States and everybody who lives there, let alone the world, and thinking people still know that and MAGA still doesn’t care. I doubt even a stunt like this would win him any new supporters.

Maybe all of that is just me, expressing my ongoing inability to grasp the death of our once-great nation. I’ve been writing and trying to warn people about what I see coming for a long time. I’ve had very little success convincing anybody of anything. These days, with the end in sight, I find myself walking around in a kind of a fugue state, operating but not fully in charge, you know? It’s a kind of low-grade shock. I would never have believed Americans would let this happen at all, let alone that so many Americans would so gleefully cheer it along.

Trump took to holding rallies outdoors, I suspect, because it was cheaper than lining up indoor venues and his campaign is trying to save money for his many criminal trials. They even held some in Arizona (rallies, not trials) and it was so hot several of his devotees passed out in the heat. (Old people just don’t tolerate heat like younger people.) Having the rallies outside, though, is what allowed this shooter to get into position in the first place. I’d guess, going forward, future rallies will be strictly indoor events…

It’s also possible this was just some random, nut-ball shooting. We’ve seen them at all kinds of events from schools to concerts. Why NOT a political rally? He’s dead, now, so we’ll never get to ask him why he did it or what he was thinking, but the shooter was a 20 year old boy. He used an AR-15, the preferred gun of mass murderers around the nation, thanks, ironically, to the MAGAGOP and the NRA. He didn’t get a lot of shots in before he was “eliminated” himself.

He was a registered Republican but gave $15 bucks to a progressive political group in 2021. Those two events likely happened in the reverse order, though. Based on his age and the timeline, he would have given the money when he was 17. Then he turned 18 and registered Republican. Law enforcement and the media will be tearing into this guy’s life for the next few weeks so we’ll know everything about him that it’s possible to know in a short time.

I don’t want violence. I have to condemn this shooting in the strongest possible terms. You may have noticed, I don’t like Trump, even a little bit. I don’t support violence against him or anyone else. Maybe the shooter was trying to kick off the “culture war,” once and for all. You know, make it look like some “libtard” tried to kill Trump so the right would pick up their guns and start shooting, too. They still might.

Trump and his MAGA followers have been advocating violence for a long time, now. Their voices have been calling for another civil war. They are the people advocating retribution and revenge on their “enemies.” (Read: fellow Americans) It can’t be a total surprise that it’s coming out and it shouldn’t be surprising that it is, perhaps, coming home to roost. Violence is rarely a one-way street…

I’ll tell you this: I fear this will not be a one-time thing. I think those shots were just the first shots. JFK’s words are screaming in my ears, now. “When you make peaceful revolution impossible, you make violent revolution inevitable.” We the people still have a choice about which way this whole thing plays out. Here’s hoping we choose more wisely than that 20 year old boy…

You Know, Speaking of Old…

by MyBaconPress

I think, I hope, (okay, I desperately pray) that enough thinking Americans still recognize the danger that is Donald Trump to come out and vote against him. The media is focused like a laser beam on Biden’s slips but not paying much attention to Trump’s. Why not? Trump doesn’t do much better than Biden when he’s speaking. They’re both old. They both show signs of decline. Only one of them, Trump, is a criminal, sexual molesting, liar.

How can he be winning? I’ll tell you this: if he is the best America could put on offer, I’m pretty sure our ethics have fallen SO far we don’t deserve to be the leaders of the free world anymore.

I still wish the Dems would replace Biden, though. He’s facing a tough, uphill battle. Under the best of conditions, he’d be fighting MAGA with the Dems supporting his efforts. But now he’s fighting the Dems, too. They want him out, he won’t leave. It’s very Ruth Bader Ginsberg of him.

She, too, had a chance to do the right thing and step away with dignity and grace, allowing Obama to replace her with a younger option. She said no. I suspect she was one of those relentlessly optimistic people whose relentless optimism blinds her to certain realities. Like, being an 87 year old woman battling cancer – and just…randomly deciding that was no problem at all. Her choice gave rise to the end of Roe. I’m sure that was not her intention but that was the result.

Biden’s relentless optimism seems to blocking his view, too. The fallout from his self-imposed blindness will likely be the end of the Republic. Yeah, yeah, they say that about every election. Only this time? The opposition is openly floating plans about the best way to end the Republic. Project 2025, anyone? If you think it’s only hyperbole this time, you’re simply not paying attention.

Biden and/or Biden’s team have done a pretty good job in the White House. Even with dementia, I’d rather have Biden in there than the usurper. Biden’s team could keep things going. But Biden is suffering an enthusiasm gap that may keep people from coming out. A younger person wouldn’t scare so many people, wondering if he or she can do the job. Then, it would just be a younger, competent person, against the feckless, felonious, fibbing fraudster who gropes women for fun.

But the media seems to be trying to pick the winner by focusing on Biden’s gaffes while mostly ignoring Trump’s. Biden has difficulty saying things but the things he says are truthful. Trump has difficulty saying things and can’t say truthful things at all. Biden has mixed up some names. So has Trump. Biden loses his train of thought. So does Trump. Trump speaks a little more smoothly – not a LOT more smoothly – a little more smoothly – and that’s only because it’s so easy for him to lie. He doesn’t CARE if what he says is accurate. That gives him less to stumble over – but he still stumbles.

For both men, age is ever-present and taking it’s toll. But only one of them has a proven and irrefutable record as a moral reprobate. What does it say about MAGA that they continue to support him?

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Rudy Giuliani’s bankruptcy dodge has come to an end. He was trying to use the bankruptcy court to protect him because he has been ordered to pay $150 million dollars to the two women he defamed while he was out lying about the 2020 election that Joe won. You remember. Those were the lies he told, sometimes in court, that got him disbarred.

Mostly, he’s been stalling. He didn’t want to pay (who would?) and thought he could hide from the consequences of his actions in bankruptcy court. But the creditors got tired of the stalling and filed for a dismissal, which the judge granted. Now the two ladies, and all of Rudy’s other creditors, are free to come after him for their money.

You can add Rudy Giuliani’s name to the long, long, oh my god, oh-so-long list of people who put their faith and trust in Donald Trump and ended in ruin – and Trump didn’t even pay him for it afterwards…

The Irony of the MAGA Mind…

by MyBaconPress

Sometimes, when I write about someone passing away, it’s with sadness because the person was good and did good things in the world. Willie Mays was like that. But sometimes, when I write about someone passing away, it’s with happiness because the person was an evil blight on humanity and did damage for money. People like Jim Inhofe.

Inhofe was definitely in the second camp. He was a Senator, a Republican (of course), and a staunch defender of the oil companies’ battle to boost climate change. Inhofe helped win that fight. Now the world will suffer increasingly hotter winters, more violent tropical storms and hurricanes, more floods, droughts, crop failures, and all the other horrible things science has been trying to warn us about since the 1950’s – only to be ignored. Or, more accurately, shouted down by people who refused to understand.

Inhofe was the moron who brought a snowball, a weather event, into the Senate chambers to show that climate change, a climate event, wasn’t real – because snow still happened. 89 years the planet suffered under the weight of this man’s stupidity. Thanks, in part, to him, we STILL get to suffer but HE shuffled off and avoided the worst of his actions. Classic con move.

Oh, well, at least I can take comfort that where he went is (reportedly) much hotter than where we are…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Do you know what I find ironic? With the help of compliant conservatives, the one percent is right on the precipice of winning their class war. I know, it’s been presented (by the one percent, remember) as a “culture war” but it’s been a class war since the start. They want to be an official aristocracy and FDR made that difficult. Sure, FDR also made the country the financial envy of the world and created the largest and strongest middle class the world had ever known but rich people couldn’t get AS rich AS fast under his rules so those rules had to go.

But they couldn’t have done it alone. They needed a mob. They found one in conservatives and they led the cons around by the nose through fraudulent (and very scary) broadcasts that looked real enough to fool people not paying too much attention. The one percent seduced the cons with easy answers. Trump’s main gift is his constant promises of easy answers to complex problems. That’s why they love him. Easy answers.

No, none of that is the ironic part. That’s just background. One of Trump’s easy answers is yet another tax cut or worse. He has actually floated the idea of eliminating income taxes altogether and replacing them with tariffs on goods. Every competent economist has blasted the proposal but “smart” and “MAGA” simply do not go together.

All of these tax cuts are a one percent wet dream as well. They just get richer and richer but, have you noticed? The country keeps having to cut services and opportunities because we can’t afford them. “Cut more!” is all we ever hear. They don’t talk about it like they used to. These days, they pretend it’s all about stimulating investment but there was a time they said the quiet part out loud.

There was this conservative Bozo known as Grover Norquist. He once held the Republican Party in his grip with nearly perfect control. He had them sign a pledge that they would never, ever raise taxes nor allow them to be raised. If they didn’t sign, they didn’t get any support from the GOP. If they DID sign, he could wave that promise around at them any time one of them seemed about to act for the good of the country instead of rich people.

Old Grover said a lot of things over the course of his career but, to me, his most famous quote is “I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.” The “reduce it to the size” part is the tax cuts. They seem designed to bankrupt the nation.
“Hey, it feels like we might be getting to the ironic part, here, pretty soon.”
“Yeah, it does.”
And so we are…

I became curious about how all of these tax cuts would affect people when the government is, finally, bankrupt. Do you know who it looks like is going to suffer the most as a result of conservative mantras? Why, mostly, that would be conservative states! Isn’t THAT ironic?

The cons only think about welfare recipients (the easy answer) and except for themselves, think ALL welfare recipients should be cut off immediately since the other ones are “only committing fraud.” But the government does a LOT more than just welfare. When one bundles all the money the Federal government gives to states that need help, the most Federally dependent states are mostly red.

Okay, there ARE a couple of blue states in there but it seems likely that, as blue states, they’ll vote against red for the good of the nation and, frankly, themselves. There’s nothing ironic about that. But if we look at the top fifteen states that are Federally dependent, we find Alaska (1), Louisiana (2), Montana (3), Arizona (5), Wyoming (6), Kentucky (8), Mississippi (9), Texas (10), West Virginia (12), and Tennessee (14).

That’s ten of the top fifteen Federally dependent states that can be counted on to do serious damage to themselves in support of the richest people in this once-great nation. Even more ironic? They’ll do that financial harm to themselves, chanting their mantra about voting their own interest – all while voting against their own interest and in rich people’s interest, instead…

Hold on to your hats, folks. It’s going to be quite a (terrifying) ride…

Can’t Decide?

by MyBaconPress

Do you know what I’ve noticed? I’ve noticed that, to a small degree, some of the voices calling for Biden to stay in the race and predicting disaster if a younger person replaces Biden are coming from the right.
“Wait, the right?”
Yes, the right. I presume they’re just being “helpful.”

Mostly, the cons are staying out of it. If the Dems want to shoot themselves in the foot (or the face, for that matter) let ’em. It’s just good strategy. But they clearly don’t mind adding just a touch of input, “supporting” Joe as the candidate. “Worrying” about the “damage” a change might do to the party’s chances. It’s really very considerate of them.

Quick question, why would MAGA suddenly think leaving Biden at the top of the ticket is a good idea? They’ve been talking about his down side for a long time – likely because of how successful his presidency has been. Now, suddenly, they want to keep Biden in the race? Yeah, that make perfect sense.

Biden really HAS had a successful administration. No, not perfect but pretty good. Literally, the ONLY rap one can honestly hang on Biden is his age. Unfortunately, that’s a pretty heavy burden for the old guy, largely because it’s true. And, no. My position is not “ageism.” Getting older takes a toll. There’s no getting around it. Nobody likes it. We all try to ignore or even deny it. But…wait, what was I saying? Oh, yeah, Getting older takes a toll…

So, in one corner, we have Trump, the worst President in American history, a serial criminal, adjudicated rapist, a bigot, a liar, an embarrassment to humanity, a “one man crime spree” who is only slithering away from justice because he so corrupted our government in his first effort that he’s being protected by toadies. In the other corner, we have a decent guy who seems interested in helping Americans and who has done the job pretty well – but he’s old. And the ‘old’ bit is holding sway.

Yes, if you replace the old guy, the (younger) replacement can’t run on the successful record. But what kind of record do we need to beat the worst President in American history, a serial criminal, adjudicated rapist, a bigot, a liar, an embarrassment to humanity, a “one man crime spree” who is only slithering away from justice because he so corrupted our government in his first effort that he’s being protected by toadies?

Is America really SO corrupt, SO lost in a moral morass it can’t decide between a decent person and the personification of the Seven Deadly Sins?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If I had ever considered buying a Tesla, I wouldn’t now. Paying their CEO $56 Billion dollars in compensation? Where does that money come from? How much of the cost of the rolling crematorium goes simply to cover that obligation? More importantly, to me, what makes anybody worth that kind of compensation? Do you really believe that if Elon Musk disappeared today, Tesla would just dry up and blow away?

That, right there, is a good example of “greedflation.” We’ve been told by cons, who don’t really understand things, that inflation is terrible and all Biden’s fault. The problem is, there IS no systemic cause for the price increases we’re all feeling. There was. Things really DID get screwed up by Covid-19 and Trump’s mismanagement of Covid-19. But the corporations have been raising prices and pretending “supply chain issues” ever since.

The thing is, the supply chain issues have been managed. The prices keep going up because people in corporate boardrooms WANT prices to keep going up. It’s pure greed, plain and simple. It’s not inflation in the traditional sense. It’s price gouging. And price gouging is NOT Biden’s fault, nor doing. It turns out, the President of the United States has very little say in corporate boardrooms.

The bit that really gets me, though, is this: out current economic problems are being blamed on some failing of Joe Biden when they are largely caused by conservative policies that have been enacted through the years under the heading of “deregulation.” Deregulation has been great for large corporations but terrible for average citizens. It turns out, if you tell a corporation they can do pretty much anything they want to do, they will.

That’s not an indictment of corporations. Corporations exist for profit. It’s what they do. The responsibility for setting the boundaries of corporate options should be, properly, borne by the society in which the corporation exists. But cons have abdicated that responsibility and now we’re ALL suffering from it.

I preferred a regulated market along with a progressive tax system. It was better. And I mean, better for everyone, even the corporations. People still got rich under the old rules, just not “harm the economy” rich. In fact, the rules and regulations protected the economy and created the largest and most powerful middle class in history. That middle class is quickly fading away as corporations are deregulated. Yes, the two are directly linked.

But you know what never happened when the government set the standard and regulated behavior? Airplane doors didn’t fall off of airplanes in the sky. Planes didn’t just…crash because some piece of software inadvertently told the plane to crash. Boeing is about to plead guilty to fraud for that one. 346 people died in those crashes. Boeing will be made to pay a fine. Nobody will go to jail because one cannot put a corporation in jail.

Theoretically, it will be harder, now, for Boeing to get government contracts because the company will, technically, be adjudicated a felon. They’re going to have to (OMG!) spend a little more money ($455 million) on safety and compliance programs they SHOULD have been observing already. I’d bet they booked more than $455 million from their loosened policies so, a win for the company.

I guess it’s just me but I prefer regulations that attempt to keep these kinds of fraudulent activities from occurring in the first place, rather than relying on lawsuits after the fact that may or may not cause the company to change it’s ways.

But I’ll tell you this: as long was we have a deceived segment of the population out there championing corporations and chastising any government role in regulating their activities, this crap is going to keep happening and will inevitably, get worse. Hold on to your hats, folks…