America and the Elections - Chaos Approaches

Well, The Donald and Hillary win big in New York and they should be the Nominees, but, not so fast. Bernie cannot win, but he is staying in and that will give him a whole lot of power at the Convention. This will continue to push her further to the left, something she dreads. Hillary was basically campaigning as a continuation of the Obama Presidency. Bernie has killed that plan. He has brought up issue after issue that have made her change her stance and has people thinking, sort of. Now polls show that Democrats want a very left wing candidate.

That is not good for Hillary. Traditionally, Candidates campaign toward the fringe and move to the middle because they know that most Americans are really pretty moderate. Bernie will have enough pull to get the Party platform moved to a position that will make Obama look like William F. Buckley and I cannot see how Hillary can maneuver around that. Of course, if elected, she will pay no attention to any of that, but it may make her election a bit problematic.

There is one way Sanders can still get the nomination. There is still a chance Hillary may be indicted over the whole email mess. I think that is unlikely but it would be hilarious to see the Democratic Party stuck with a Candidate for President who was under indictment.

The Republicans are in a mess and it could not happen to a more deserving bunch of folks. Trump still has a fair shot at wrapping up a first ballot nomination and that in itself is a huge issue for Party leaders, but, if Trump fails at that, a distinct possibility, then all hell will break loose at their Convention. Ted Cruz, at that point, would start trying to pressure the delegates, who at that point would be free to vote for anyone, to side with him. The Nation will witness politics at its sleaziest. All sides will resort to any steps possible to get those votes. Ted's problem is that he is about a likeable as a wolverine. However, most of the Party's leaders dislike The Donald at least as much.

What of Kasich? Good question. He seems a likeable and basically honest guy and, by most accounts has been a decent Governor. More to the point, polls show repeatedly that he is the one Republican candidate that can beat Hillary. Yet, for reasons that I just cannot figure, he cannot win Primaries. Still, if the Convention gets to a 3rd vote, he may be the man. That will cause all those folks who voted for Trump and Cruz to grow apoplectic and the Party will fall to bits. In short, if the Republicans finally settle for the one man who might win in November, he will likely not get the support of his own party and will likely not win. Isn't this fun. I have never, in all my many years of watching politics seen anything like this mess..

But wait, it might get better. If Kasich cannot win on the 3rd or 4th ballot, there are others standing by. Do not forget Little Marco who still has a few votes. Then, if all else fails, we have Jeb Bush who might step forward and offer his services as a compromise candidate. Also, there is Paul Ryan. Yes, I know, he said that he absolutely would not take the job. That is what he said about becoming Speaker of the House, right before he took the job.

On top of all of that, there is still a chance that someone, if they get angry enough at the way the Conventions go, might start a 3rd Party run. With tempers as high as they have been recently, I almost expect that. Then the real fun begins because, if whoever it is can get enough support to keep anyone from getting a majority in the General Election, the entire mess goes to the House of Representatives, where they will pick a President and God only knows who that might be.

Stay tuned, folks. Things will just get funnier.

American Gullibility - Part 2

Let us now turn our attention to some of the nonsense Americans have been fed, and have swallowed, on the domestic front. In the interest of brevity, we will skip Lincoln's rape of the Constitution and Wilson's unforgivable role in the creation of the Federal Reserve. Let's begin with JFK.

Here, 52 years later, we still have no clue as to Kennedy's assassin. We have theories galore, ranging from the laughable, Oswald acted alone, to the frightening, the CIA acted in cooperation with extreme right wing rich folks. It is certainly fun to play with the possibilities, we all love a good mystery, but it is absurd that we still have no idea what happened.

We do know, from their own records, that the CIA was, at that point, in the midst of the MKUltra experiments. In case you have not heard of these, in brief, the Agency, in an effort to learn how to control the human mind, were conducting a range of experiments on US citizens, involving, drugs, torture, hypnosis, and any nightmarish scenario they could come up with. By the way, a lot of those experiments were the suggestions of supposedly ex-Nazis scientists we had imported after WW2 as part of the incredibly illegal Operation Paperclip.

Then, we have LBJ. The man was insane. That is the only way to explain his belief that we could afford to send 500000 troops to Viet Nam while conducting a major social initiative, the Great Society and the War on Poverty. Guess what? It cannot be done.

Nixon, of course, was de-throned by Watergate. Much like the JFK assassination, this event has never been satisfactorily explained. It did not happen because Nixon was afraid of losing the election. At that point, the Republicans could have nominated Bullwinkle J. Moose and beaten McGovern. What really  happened? Who knows?

Skip ahead to Ronnie Reagan, we see a huge hustle being pulled off, two actually. First, he convinced everyone that all the Nation's woes were do to too many laws and Congress, like little puppets, said, "yes sir," and de-regulated most everything. You will see later that this was definitely a bad idea. Second, the Old Gipper turned loose Ollie North and his merry band, who, in an effort to illegally fund rebels in Nicaragua. flooded the Land with cocaine.

George Herbert Walker Bush, a loathsome individual, promised, repeatedly, no new taxes, before he oversaw the raising of taxes. By the end of his term, the economy was in awful shape.

Then, we have Bill "Slick Willie" Clinton. For now, I will not mention all, and there are many, of his sleazy escapades, to focus on his rape of the Social Security Fund. He makes much of his balancing of the Federal Budget, but always omits the fact that he did this by, with no legal justification, borrowing from Social Security, money that has never been paid back. To any younger readers, do not count on drawing Social Security in your old age. The economy did boom while he was in office, but that had nothing to do with him. He was just lucky to be around when the Tech Bubble was happening. Of course, like all bubbles, it broke, leaving many a poor yuppie.

Next, we move to George Walker Bush, a man as loathsome as his Father. Let us overlook 9/11 and the whole Weapons of Mass Destruction nonsense. On the Domestic front, he should be remembered for his lack of action during the collapse of the Housing Bubble and the monstrous Banking Scandals, both the direct result of Reagan's de-regulation program. How a President can sit by and do nothing while big time investment banks not only collapse, but continue paying those who oversaw the collapse huge salaries and ridiculous salaries is beyond me. He should have called for their dismissal and deep Federal investigations. Instead, he called for tax payer bailouts. Oh, he did accomplish something else. He oversaw the creation of the Patriot Act. If you wish to know more about that, simply read Orwell's 1984.

Leaping to the present, we find Barak Obama. Barry O has been a busy fellow. First, he has tightened the noose of the Patriot Act, after hinting that he wanted it repealed. Second, he has forgotten that he is supposed to, according to our much neglected Constitution, govern in cooperation with Congress. Instead, he has signed a dizzying array of Executive Orders. I am still not sure why the legality of these unilateral actions has not been questioned but, it hasn't. Finally, we have his pride and joy, the Health Care Act. After he rammed this through Congress, many discovered that they had to drop plans they liked in exchange for more, much more, expensive plans. Businesses in a time of a stagnant economy, had an expense added that they could not really afford, so many dropped workers and began using part-timers they didn't have to cover. There were actually cases of post-menopausal women having to take policies that included pregnancy coverage. Those who were poor were told, "don't worry, the States will help you," only to find that they weren't eligible for help or that their State was one of many who were not going to help.

Why do I say Americans are gullible? Simple. Many when confronted with these facts refuse to believe them. "Oh, no, our Government wouldn't do that." More, will admit problems but insist that all of these issues can be fixed by voting for the right Candidate in the upcoming election. That is the gullibility factor comes in, and that is what I will discuss in my next installment.

In the meantime, most Americans will not give any of this a thought. All they want is football on the TV and a full refrigerator they can waddle over to. It is no accident that you see so many of those annoying erectile dysfunction treatment ads on sports programs.

America May Be the Big Loser in this Year's Campaign

I watched the news today and found that the main story, talked about ad nauseum, was the ridiculous controversy between Trump and Clinton, who seem hell bent to take this campaign to new lows. She's claiming that ISIL is using him as a recruiting tool. True? Who knows? I am not about to start frequenting their websites to find out, but the consensus is, no. They could, they might, but not yet. I will say that he is giving them a great target.

So the Donald has called her a liar. True? Of course; she's been caught in lies often, but, to be fair. I don't know of a politician who doesn't lie. Still. a toning down of the rhetoric may not be a bad idea. After all, we have a huge number of major issues to solve and we really need to keep these useless debates above schoolyard level.

But, the Donald, in his drive to obliterate the competition has stooped lower in using a Yiddish obscenity to describe her loss to Obama. I can honestly say that he has reached a new low. I have seen campaigns since Kennedy and Nixon competed and never have I heard a candidate use such a term. Now, profanity doesn't shock me, and, when used sparingly, doesn't offend me, but there is a time a place for everything and Trump crossed it. Of course this is a man who recently called Jeb Bush 'an embarrassment to his family.' I loathe the Bushes but engaging in such attacks does nothing to advance the dialogue needed to begin solving some of our problems.

However, our despicable media has latched onto this like a pit bull on pork roast. A dizzying array of   talking heads have already crossed the screen analyzing this juvenile display. Mind you, I am not saying I disagree with Trump, but, seriously, can't we do a bit better.

By the way, neither of these two have been nominated yet. The Donald is by no means a sure thing. So far, he is attracting attention because he is loud, entertaining, and makes a lot of valid points, but, he is something g of a novelty act. We don't know if those who support him in polls will actually turn out and vote. Clinton has her own problems since there is still a fair chance that she will be indicted for her email problems. I don't think so, but maybe. We can only hope.

If these two are the nominees, I believe that I will ignore the campaigns. I will probably vote for anyone other that Clinton, unless Jeb somehow manages, against all odds, to get the nomination. If, God forbid, it is a Clinton-Bush battle, I think I will spend the time doing something more useful, like watching cartoons.

America and Fear - Part 4

Finally, we arrive at the era of Bush 2, George W., henceforth known in my blog as the Shrub. How this man became President is a mystery. Heck, how he graduated from Yale Law School is beyond me. The man can barely string two words together and coherent thoughts are foreign to him. I guess when your daddy is rich, ex Congress, exCIA, ex Vice President, ex President, you can get away with a lot. In my Is Paris Burning Series? on terrorism, I wrote of his disasterous Mid East policy, so for information on that I refer you there. All I need say here is that it has left us with a bunch of half decided battles, wars that will seemingly last forever, and a smear of deep red blood spread over the Mid East that is rapidly spreading to Europe. We have earned the enmity of most of the Moslem world.                                  

 

At home, he did no better. To be fair, the bank scandals that ultimately crippled the economy were not his doing. No,the Old Gipper convinced Congress that we didn't need any silly regulations hampering industries and they said a collective, "yes Sir." and dutifully repealed a lot of them. When the Shrub took office, the chickens came home to roost and we learned that some of the Nation's largest and most trusted Investment Banks were running scams that would make a common grifter blush, all the while giving themselves huge bonuses and raises.                                                 

Had it just been the wealthy who were hit when the crap hit the fan, I wouldn't care. After all, when you lie down with pigs, you ahould expect to get a might dirty, but many of the funds that failed were held by people who were just trying to get ahead in life, young couples thinking to the future of their kids and older couples hoping for a nice retirement. Gone, swindled. Again, not strictly the Shrubs fault, but when the truth became obvious, I don't recall him calling for criminal charges and prison terms. No, of course not, these were his buddies, his financial bakckers. In other words, these were the guys calling the shots and he knew not to mess with them.                                                                                 

To say I did not like him is an understatement, but, in retrospect, he almost looks good next to Obama. Almost. Our current President has less business holding that job than Elmo. He is arrogant and has come to believe that his word is law. I remember when the Government was in one of its perpetual budget crises. He threatened to block Social Security checks from being issued. When it was pointed out to him that such a move would cause great hardship for many, he made it clear tha he was unmoved by that and that he would follow that course of action if Congress did not bow to his wishes. Blessedly, they did.                                                                            

He has no comprehensive foreign policy. We are told, by him, that we have a plan, it will work, and he is sticking to it, despite great evidence to the contrary. The whole thing is a miserable failure. He is however pushing Climate control, something Americans are not as concerned about. Terrorism and the Economy, those are our basic issues right now, but Barry will have his way, and I guarantee that he will push through an agreement that will be a disaster, just like the horrible deal he made with Iran over their nuclear program.                                                                                           

Are Americans afraid? Damn right they are. They have come to see the government as the enemy and with good reason, since they have made a mess out of a great Nation.We have had years of constant, extreme change and on top of that, we have no idea where we are headed and no sign of a real, competent leader (sorry Trump, you do not inspire trust, no matter how much you try to sound like one of us). Pile stress upon stress and anyone will break. We haven't broken yet, but how much more we can take is questionable. In the next, and last part of this series, I will, attempt to throw out a few ideas. Nothing will be easy.

America and Fear - Part 3

The 70s, a mere 40 years ago were the silly age, on the surface. They did however give rise to one of the great scourges of humanity, one of the terrors of the ages, disco, a word that should strike terror into the hearts of all who have any musical taste. Other than that, folks just acted goofy and after the weirdness of the 60s,that wasn't surprising.

However, under the silliness, things got worse, and I'll deal with two incidents. First, Watergate, another of those things I have never heard a rational explanation of. Why would Nixon, assured of an easy victory over McGovern, pull something like that? I do not believe that he was worried about the Democrats having evidence of shady manipulations of campaign funds and dirty tricks. After all, the Democrats were doing the same thing and Nixon no doubt could have shown evidence of their misbehavior. No, I think that either a) they had something really nasty he had done and he was afraid of political blackmail, or b) they knew of something historically explosive ( say, something connected with the JFK Assassination), or c), Nixon was set up, that the Powers that Be wanted him gone and knew that they simply couldn't keep shooting Presidents. What could that something have been? Personally, I believe that it had to do with drugs. Nixon seemed to think that he, as President, actually ran the country, a foolish notion, and seemed serious about stopping the drug trade. Operation Intercept kept Mexican weed out for a good while much to the dismay of myself and my friends.  Keep in mind, a whole lot of money was invested in the drug trade, some of it by some very influential folks with short tempers. Mind you that is just my opinion. I have no proof. Anyway, the American people, still shell-shocked from the previous decade, were witness to a scandal the likes of which we had never seen. Day after day, the top men in the Executive branch of the Government were paraded in front of Senators and pounded with questions about their unseemly behavior. Finally, Nixon, no doubt as confused as the rest of us, did the right thing, or the sort of right thing, and resigned. People joked about the whole mess,  but trust me, Americans were devastated.

At the same time, cocaine became an increasingly popular recreation. A stupid, mind numbing drug, it was the logical next step in drug use. High on coke, you can bargain, run around, do business, and still dance the night away and we suddenly saw large number of people shoveling mounds of white powder up their noses. More and more, Americans were becoming used to buying and using illegal drugs. First marijuana and acid, then coke. Of course not everyone loved the white devil. Those of us going through a post acid hangover were more inclined toward barbiturates, valium, and alcohol. Tequila became very popular. Now remember, that the strategy and channels for the illegal distribution of drugs had been set during Prohibition. Change product and you are now dealing drugs. Then the big one hit the streets. Heroin hit the suburbs. Heroin had been dealt throughout the 40s and 50s, but as long as it went to white ne'er -do -wells and the ghettos, no one cared. In the 70s, a heroin epidemic hit middle class America, but, to be blunt, despite a lot of public wailing, no one much cared. Oh well, at least the Viet Nam mess ended.           

Oh, one more thing, picture from the jungle of SE Asia started showing up, pictures of US Special Forces and CIA agents guarding helicopters that were being loaded with opium, on its way to becoming the junk that people were sticking in their veins. To this day, people can see those pictures and still deny that happened. We call that cognitive dissonance and that, my dear readers, is a symptom of extreme fear.                  

There was one other little thing going on in the 70s. Iran overthrew the Shah and dared to pick their own leader. For further detail, I refer you to my series entitled Is Paris Burning? For now, suffice it to say, we were losing our grip on the Mid-East.        

On to the great 80s when greed was the main focus  of American life and Ronnie Reagan was our Cheerleader-in- Chief. The Old Gipper promised to fight the Commies and by God, he did. The evil Soviet Empire collapsed. Of course to do this, he ran up such deficits that we will never be out of debt. At the same time, to beat the Evil Nicaraguan Sandinistas, he and a merry crew including head boy scout Ollie North were having mountains of cocaine flown into Mena Arkansas by CIA operative Barry Seal. Surely you remember Mena, a place run by the future President and his wife, also a likely
 future President. But Slick Willie will have to wait.                                                                           

He has to wait because no visit to the 80s would be complete without a remembrance of George HW Bush, a whiny ass of a man. By the way, remember the CIA opium smuggling, remember the cocaine runs of the Reagan era? Well, George "Poppy" Bush was a big deal in the CIA during the opium days and Vice President during the coke days. That, of course, proves nothing, but, darn it all, things do seem a wee bit coincidental.For reasons unclear (have you noticed a pattern. we keep doing things that make absolutely no sense) he got us into the Gulf War against our one time puppet, Sadam Hussein. To give Poppy Bush his due, when we had humiliated Hussein's forces, an easy task since they didn't fight back a whole lot, he got us out, using a really cool exit strategy. He just said, "We win," and we left. At home, one and all cheered our victory and few bothered to ask, "Just what the hell did we win?"                                     
                                                                                                                                          
 Now, we get to the 90s and the reign of one of our most despicable Presidents, Willie Clinton and his equally loathsome spouse. These two should be sitting in jail for life, given all the crap they have pulled. I always thought fitting punishment would be to sit them in a maximum security prison, locked in the same room, 24/7, unable to see or speak to anyone else. Instead, he runs around making 10s of millions giving speeches and she is very possibly, even likely, to be our next President. One good thing during the Clinton years, the technology boom. We made all sorts of really cool new stuff. One problem. Some not so nice folks played fast and loose with the stock market and what was a bubble that made a lot of traders rich, burst and made the same traders poor again. Oh well, what goes up, comes down. The Clinton era also saw two shameful events take place. First, the slaughter of the branch Davidians in Waco. The story we have been fed does not make sense, but I guess we should be used to that by now. Whatever happened, if Federal authorities cannot put a stop to an unstable situation, without killing everyone and burning children alive, then we have reached a sorry state indeed. Also, a bit after Waco, we had the Oklahoma City bombing. I won't even mention the official explanation. By now so many holes have been pushed through that inane tale that it sinks on first glance. Someone knew something and it was the job of the President to find out the truth, not to except a half-assed bunch of crap that we were fed. When something happens on a Presidents watch, he has the responsibility to seek truth and justice. All of our recent leaders, and this goes not just for Presidents, but Congressmen, Military leaders, Diplomats, Religious leaders, local and state Government officials, and Business leaders have forgotten Harry Truman's famous motto "the buck stops here." Now, one and all try to pass the buck down the line until we just get tired of watching the whole sorry show.                                                     
                                                       

 We are now just 15 years from the present, and before we get to the recent nighmares, stop and think about all the change we've seen, and trust me, we have just hit the big stuff. Humans can deal well with change, but not constant upheaval, Put enough stress on anyone, and they break. But, enough for now. Get ready as in the next episode, the weird reaches the Outer Limits.                                                                                                      

America Loves Experts

I have touched on this before, but I can't get it off my mind. Day after day, as you watch news programming, you are confronted with an array of experts. They pose and pontificate and sagely nod at the cameras as they talk to the hosts about the woes of the world. Only one problem, they don't have a clue what they are talking about.

What proof do I have of that? Simple. They seldom get anything right Remember back to the days of George W. Bush, henceforth to be known in this blog as the Shrub. As he launched the attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan, talking head after talking head appeared to assure the American people that we would prevail and banish the evil doers in short order. 15 years later, we are still there, still fighting and watching lives destroyed by bombs and insurgency. The only difference is that we now are also involved in Syria.

We were told by countless medical experts a few years ago to get ready for a pandemic of H1N1 flu. A few cases showed up and proved to a very mild strain. Ebola was to be a scourge that would wipe out large chunks of Africa before turning to the US. It killed for a brief while and died out. More die in Africa from hideous tribal warfare than from disease. Sars was poised to spread from Asia to the west; it didn't.

On a less dire note, what we are supposed to eat and the foods we are to avoid changes on a regular basis. Coffee, alcohol, butter, milk, and red meat were all declared only slightly less toxic than arsenic; now, they are considered okay, at least until next weeks study. Water was declared the key and folks became obsessed with remaining hydrated, giving rise to the bizarre sight of people constantly strolling around with plastic water bottles. When I was young, we just had a drink before we left home and I don't recall to many people dying of dehydration. Now, the consensus is that too much water has become a real problem. Salt, which I truly thought would be banned, is now considered a necessity.

When we began to experience our deep economic collapse, back in the Shrub's day, financial experts said that while we were in a rough time, we certainly were not in a recession. They kept saying that, quite literally until the day the government said we were in a recession. "Hang onto your investments," they cried, as people lost their retirement funds. "The banks are sound," they assured, until said banks began whining for bailouts. When we bailed them out we were told that they would start immediately lending money and that would jump start the recovery. Instead they sat on the money and gave themselves enormous bonuses. (how you can get a bonus when your business almost failed is beyond me).We were assured that the housing bubble collapse was brief, as it kept worsening. "The economy has turned the corner," we were told, as unemployment continued to rise. The economy was declared sound even though jobs refused to reappear.

Why do we do it? Why do we sit and watch these idiots parade across the screen, day after day, spouting nonsense? Either these fools are deluded to the point of near psychosis or they are lying to push a point that they think will benefit themselves. Day after day, the news channels drag these numbskulls out and solemnly ask their expert opinions when, again, they are either compulsive liars or lost in Wonderland with Alice. These are people who have years of experience on top of years of study. How can they be so consistently wrong? And, more to the point, why do we Americans who have more good common sense in their little toes than these pundits do in their entire body, keep listening. Turn on the news, get the headlines, and if nothing of earth-shaking importance is going on, turn the news off. Play with the dog, read a book, go for a walk, just turn off the news. If you must keep the TV on, watch something more intellectual; I recommend SpongeBob Square Pants.