It’s looking like left wing anarchists and right wing anarchists are the one bringing violence to Minneapolis. I see the hand of Russia in this - turn Americans against each other.
Too bad we don’t have a president who can deal with this.
Saturday, May 30, 2020
We need transformative purges
The cold blooded murder of George Floyd by racist police officers has sparked protests, and eventually riots, across the nation.
Riots are the natural expression of the powerless. Most of the protest is legal, and some is just criminal, so by all means prosecute the criminals. BUT, don't try to dismiss these actions as anything other than the rage of the powerless who see, time and time and time and time and time again, police killing unarmed and helpless black men.
How are blacks supposed to respond? Peacefully? How about Colin Kaepernick? He lost his job for protesting peacefully.
When star football players took a knee prior to a football game to protest police killings of unarmed black men, the racist reaction was vicious. They changed the story from an attempt to call attention to a terrible injustice to a story of blacks disrespecting the flag and the military who gave their lives for the freedoms that the flag represents. Their protest had nothing to do with disrespecting the flag and had nothing to do with disrespecting the military. It was calling attention to a system that allowed police to kill blacks with little consequence.
It is time for a transformative purge of police departments across America. I am encouraged that so many police chiefs are outraged by the actions of the killers of George Floyd. And I hope that many police departments have already made good strides in cleaning up their act.
But, I have no doubt that every officer in every police department knows exactly who the racist and violent officers are. And, I have no doubt that every police chief knows that same information. My deepest wish is that every police department uses this event as permission to cleanse themselves of these poisons.
It is time for a transformative purge of racist and violent officers from every police and sheriff department in the country.
If a police chief isn't sure who the bad cops are, you can be sure the black and brown residents who suffer from them do know. Just ask.....
Riots are the natural expression of the powerless. Most of the protest is legal, and some is just criminal, so by all means prosecute the criminals. BUT, don't try to dismiss these actions as anything other than the rage of the powerless who see, time and time and time and time and time again, police killing unarmed and helpless black men.
How are blacks supposed to respond? Peacefully? How about Colin Kaepernick? He lost his job for protesting peacefully.
When star football players took a knee prior to a football game to protest police killings of unarmed black men, the racist reaction was vicious. They changed the story from an attempt to call attention to a terrible injustice to a story of blacks disrespecting the flag and the military who gave their lives for the freedoms that the flag represents. Their protest had nothing to do with disrespecting the flag and had nothing to do with disrespecting the military. It was calling attention to a system that allowed police to kill blacks with little consequence.
It is time for a transformative purge of police departments across America. I am encouraged that so many police chiefs are outraged by the actions of the killers of George Floyd. And I hope that many police departments have already made good strides in cleaning up their act.
But, I have no doubt that every officer in every police department knows exactly who the racist and violent officers are. And, I have no doubt that every police chief knows that same information. My deepest wish is that every police department uses this event as permission to cleanse themselves of these poisons.
It is time for a transformative purge of racist and violent officers from every police and sheriff department in the country.
If a police chief isn't sure who the bad cops are, you can be sure the black and brown residents who suffer from them do know. Just ask.....
Monday, May 25, 2020
The virus is opening our hearts to a new "normal"
This world wide virus is making the world slow down, pause, stop. This has never happened before. Contrary to some who are trying to diminish the impact of this gigantic event, I see this as the most disruptive and world changing event since WWII.
I don't know the answers, but I can certainly see the problems - the two main structural defects in America and the world are an economy that produces huge economic disparities in the country, and that produces world wide environmental destruction.
I don't know the solutions, but I am sure that we are not going to return to "normal" - a "normal" that continues these structural deformities.
This gigantic world wide event shows us that we are all connected, whether we like it or not. The virus spreads, first among the poor who can't protect themselves as the wealthy can, and then to all It connects us also, through our seeing the suffering and devastation - it connects us through compassion.
My vision is that this world wide crisis helps us all to open your hearts to care about each other. Which will diminish the greed of the predatory business models. Which will diminish the greed of environmentally destructive business models. Which will create supportive business models that nurture and care for workers. Which will create business models that nurture and restore the environment.
I don’t know what these emerging business models are. But I can dream them. And I can expect them. And I can sincerely hope and pray that the smartest young minds turn from previous generations' focus on getting rich into a focus on taking care of each other, economically and environmentally. Turn to a true prosperity for themselves and for the world and for humanity.
In the '60s the smartest minds went into science and engineering to create the miracle of getting to the moon. And they succeeded.
Then, the smartest minds turned to making huge fortunes, and the Harvard and MIT geniuses went to Wall Street. That has not been a wonderful thing for the country, as it ended up in the financial crash of 2008, ended up in too much economic inequality, ended up in a planet becoming inhospitable for human habitation.
It is time for a fundamental change in goals, in dreams, in destinies, in deciding what matters. I have great faith in today's youth who are facing these realities in ways that we Boomers can't really imagine. I have every expectation that the new world they create will be an answer to the current deformities.
I am not talking about some kind of left wing politics. I am talking about each of us opening our hearts to care about others and the world. And out of that, the predatory destructions of the economics of greed just fade away.
I can dream.....
I don't know the answers, but I can certainly see the problems - the two main structural defects in America and the world are an economy that produces huge economic disparities in the country, and that produces world wide environmental destruction.
I don't know the solutions, but I am sure that we are not going to return to "normal" - a "normal" that continues these structural deformities.
This gigantic world wide event shows us that we are all connected, whether we like it or not. The virus spreads, first among the poor who can't protect themselves as the wealthy can, and then to all It connects us also, through our seeing the suffering and devastation - it connects us through compassion.
My vision is that this world wide crisis helps us all to open your hearts to care about each other. Which will diminish the greed of the predatory business models. Which will diminish the greed of environmentally destructive business models. Which will create supportive business models that nurture and care for workers. Which will create business models that nurture and restore the environment.
I don’t know what these emerging business models are. But I can dream them. And I can expect them. And I can sincerely hope and pray that the smartest young minds turn from previous generations' focus on getting rich into a focus on taking care of each other, economically and environmentally. Turn to a true prosperity for themselves and for the world and for humanity.
In the '60s the smartest minds went into science and engineering to create the miracle of getting to the moon. And they succeeded.
Then, the smartest minds turned to making huge fortunes, and the Harvard and MIT geniuses went to Wall Street. That has not been a wonderful thing for the country, as it ended up in the financial crash of 2008, ended up in too much economic inequality, ended up in a planet becoming inhospitable for human habitation.
It is time for a fundamental change in goals, in dreams, in destinies, in deciding what matters. I have great faith in today's youth who are facing these realities in ways that we Boomers can't really imagine. I have every expectation that the new world they create will be an answer to the current deformities.
I am not talking about some kind of left wing politics. I am talking about each of us opening our hearts to care about others and the world. And out of that, the predatory destructions of the economics of greed just fade away.
I can dream.....
Friday, May 22, 2020
Is Trump trying to kill his cult?
The president has just demanded that churches open up "right now". I guess he thinks that is what his evangelical cult followers want, so he thinks this is going to boost his ratings. And, of course, the only thing (other than money) that he cares about is his ratings.
Of course, we know that if you ignore social distancing and ignore sheltering in place you dramatically increase the spread of the virus. But, maybe he is actually too dense to accept that obvious fact.
So, he seems to be on a campaign to get his evangelical followers, his Fox News followers, his white supremacist followers killed off. Very strange.
And, of course, the spread will go well beyond his cult and increase the spread of the virus geometrically to all of us.
There hasn't been a more blatant example of the damage that an out of control ego can do since WWI and WWII. This is really hard to believe.
Of course, we know that if you ignore social distancing and ignore sheltering in place you dramatically increase the spread of the virus. But, maybe he is actually too dense to accept that obvious fact.
So, he seems to be on a campaign to get his evangelical followers, his Fox News followers, his white supremacist followers killed off. Very strange.
And, of course, the spread will go well beyond his cult and increase the spread of the virus geometrically to all of us.
There hasn't been a more blatant example of the damage that an out of control ego can do since WWI and WWII. This is really hard to believe.
Tuesday, May 19, 2020
Trump claims he is taking hydroxichloriquine.
I don’t believe him.
He wants people to think that if you get the disease there is a miracle cure. The drug doesn’t work.
He pretends that it does so that the economy speeds up. And the stock market goes up. And his ratings go up. Which is all that he thinks about. So he is pretending to take the drug to prove that it is not harmful and works. No way Is he actually taking the drug.
The drug will have no negative effects on him because he won’t be taking it.
Always remember that he is a con man.
He wants people to think that if you get the disease there is a miracle cure. The drug doesn’t work.
He pretends that it does so that the economy speeds up. And the stock market goes up. And his ratings go up. Which is all that he thinks about. So he is pretending to take the drug to prove that it is not harmful and works. No way Is he actually taking the drug.
The drug will have no negative effects on him because he won’t be taking it.
Always remember that he is a con man.
Saturday, May 9, 2020
It's not over
Everyone is really tired of this COVID-19 pandemic. Everyone is really tired of sheltering in place. So, lots and lots of people want to come out and go back to work and back to the way it was. But....
It is true that the collapse of the economy is forcing us to open businesses back up. It is true that the economic toll is so dire that we can't just shelter in place forever. But we have to do it with what we have learned so far - social distancing and masks are absolutely needed, please.
And we desperately need tests, tests, tests, tests...
Because we don't have a national strategy from the Trump administration we don't have the two mandatory things we need to actually go back into the world - millions and millions of tests to give to people as a condition of being in public, and an effective drug or other remedy to help people come back from the disease easier and quicker. These are massive failings on the part of our national government. It is literally unimaginable to me that we don't have a national strategy and funding to work our way through this plague.
I wrote on April 1 that there are two huge structural problems in our economy - first, an ever increasing inequality of income between the rich and the poor. The Middle Class has been hollowed out for four decades. Huge percentages of people cannot go two paychecks without going hungry or lose their homes. When the poor are forced into an unbearable suffering, revolutions happen.
Second, our economy is destroying the environment - e.g. ocean warming is wiping out the coral reefs which generate a food chain that goes all the way up to us.
So, during the Democratic Primaries I wanted a moderate like Biden because I was certain that Sanders or Yang would be too socialist and lose to a man who is pathologically cruel, arrogantly ignorant, and grandiosely unable to deal with reality. His latest delusion is that the virus will go away by itself without vaccines. Hard to believe that anyone voted for him.
But, how does Yang's UBI, Universal Basic Income, look now? He was talking about jobs and careers disappearing to computers and automation, but what will our economy look like in two years? How many industries just won't come back?
And, how does Medicare for All sound now? How many millions have lost not only their job but have lost their health coverage? Can we live in a country where so many millions are left to the cruelties of this terrible pandemic? or the next health catastrophe?
It's not over. The next big wave of COVID-19 cases will be the rural areas of Trump's red states. And the second wave in the cities is also likely to come.
It's not over. It's just starting.
It is true that the collapse of the economy is forcing us to open businesses back up. It is true that the economic toll is so dire that we can't just shelter in place forever. But we have to do it with what we have learned so far - social distancing and masks are absolutely needed, please.
And we desperately need tests, tests, tests, tests...
Because we don't have a national strategy from the Trump administration we don't have the two mandatory things we need to actually go back into the world - millions and millions of tests to give to people as a condition of being in public, and an effective drug or other remedy to help people come back from the disease easier and quicker. These are massive failings on the part of our national government. It is literally unimaginable to me that we don't have a national strategy and funding to work our way through this plague.
I wrote on April 1 that there are two huge structural problems in our economy - first, an ever increasing inequality of income between the rich and the poor. The Middle Class has been hollowed out for four decades. Huge percentages of people cannot go two paychecks without going hungry or lose their homes. When the poor are forced into an unbearable suffering, revolutions happen.
Second, our economy is destroying the environment - e.g. ocean warming is wiping out the coral reefs which generate a food chain that goes all the way up to us.
So, during the Democratic Primaries I wanted a moderate like Biden because I was certain that Sanders or Yang would be too socialist and lose to a man who is pathologically cruel, arrogantly ignorant, and grandiosely unable to deal with reality. His latest delusion is that the virus will go away by itself without vaccines. Hard to believe that anyone voted for him.
But, how does Yang's UBI, Universal Basic Income, look now? He was talking about jobs and careers disappearing to computers and automation, but what will our economy look like in two years? How many industries just won't come back?
And, how does Medicare for All sound now? How many millions have lost not only their job but have lost their health coverage? Can we live in a country where so many millions are left to the cruelties of this terrible pandemic? or the next health catastrophe?
It's not over. The next big wave of COVID-19 cases will be the rural areas of Trump's red states. And the second wave in the cities is also likely to come.
It's not over. It's just starting.
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