The purpose of the phony ballot audits by Trumpster fanatics

Why are the Trump Cult conducting an obviously phony “audit” of the votes in Arizona after there were already two official audits conducted by professionals?  It’s pretty easy to understand, it is to discredit trust in democracy itself so that the oligarchs and fascists can take power by force.  Trump is the figurehead, but the forces of oligarchical fascist tyranny run long and deep in America, most notably in the Jim Crow South after the Civil War, and they see this as their time to end the use of government to empower people's lives and instead to use government for the purpose they want – fascist oligarchical wealth and power.  Pretty much the definition of oligarchical rule. 

Sadly, so many are fooled into thinking that by giving their personal power to their authoritarian oligarchical bosses they are somehow becoming more free – free from compassionate caring about other people, free from caring about other species, or the environment, or succeeding generations.  Free to buy guns and shoot each other, I suppose.  Free to force their women to have unwanted babies.  Free to put black and brown people “in their place”.  

The oligarchs are happy to give them these tiny satisfactions as long as they themselves get to feed their endless avarice and domination, so long as they can continue to destroy the environment by running their fossil fuel and massive agribusiness industries without having to make changes needed to halt and reverse the catastrophic climate change, biodiversity destruction, endless pollution of our planet that is killing the forests, oceans, species, and humans.  

We live in dangerous times, but so many of us are waking up to the real needs that the planet is forcing upon us.  And indeed, there are a few glimmers that some of the massive industries are at least pretending to care about the planet, so I choose to hope.

We need a second Reconstruction in Trumpistan

After the Civil War, President Ulysses S Grant implemented Reconstruction in the South and put troops into the Confederate states to ensure that the former slaves were allowed to vote, hold office, and protect their full rights as citizens per the 14^th and 15^th amendments.  But the election of 1876 culminated in the infamous Compromise of 1877 where the southern Democrats conceded the election to the Republican Hayes in exchange for removing the troops from the South, thus allowing the reign of Jim Crow terror for nearly a century in the South which was only reversed by the Civil Rights movement and voting rights legislation in the 1960s. 

Now, thanks to the Republican appointed members of the Supreme Court, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was effectively struck down in 2013 by a 5-4 vote allowing racist states to change their election laws without getting federal approval.  And, of course, the south moved immediately to constrict voting of black and brown citizens, because, well, because they could. And because they have every intention of keeping blacks and browns from voting and holding power.

And now, after Trump lost decisively in the 2020 election, and because the deeply corrupt Trump refused to concede and has ridiculously and falsely claimed that he actually won the election – in a landslide, for goodness sake – the Republican Party has seized upon this lie to do their best to reinstate Jim-Crow-like suppression of black and brown votes by closing polling booths, restricting mail in ballots, restricting early voting, ending automatic voter registration, and even makes it a crime to pass out water to those in the long lines in minority communities waiting to vote (!).  They do this on the pretense of ending voter fraud – which has been proven over and over and over again to be insignificant to the point of meaninglessness.  It is racist  voter suppression, and nothing else.

In other words – the racist Republican Party was given full permission by the racist Republican appointed Supreme Court members to implement their racist/white supremacist agenda and do what they can to strip black and brown people of their full rights as citizens of the United States.

So, what we need in the United States is a second Reconstruction – probably not federal troops to guard the polls and drop boxes, etc. during elections (but that may not be a bad idea).  Rather a good place to start is for the Senate to join with the House and pass HR-1, the 2021 Voting Rights Act that would do things like establish voter registration and mail in voting standards, establish fair redistricting reforms (for both parties), mandate exposure of “dark money” donors (for both parties), establish stronger ethics rules, and – oh yes – require candidates to release their tax returns.  All of these hurt the Republican Party strategy of suppressing black and brown votes.

The only way for the Senate to pass this bill, and this bill is needed to preserve democracy in the United States, is to end the anti-constitutional filibuster.  (I guess the filibuster is not UNconstitutional, but it was certainly not in the Constitution and is contrary to the spirit of the Constitution)

Would the Republicans force through an anti-Voting Rights Bill if they take over in the future?  Of course - unless they actually wake up and decide to be politicians rather than oligarchical tyrants dedicated to preserving the power of the white supremacists and plutocrats. 

They could actually try to win votes rather than suppress votes.  What a concept!

Time to end the unconstitutional filibuster

Senate Republicans used the filibuster to reject a bipartisan Congressional investigation into the January 6, 2021 insurrection that attempted to overturn the election of President Biden.  The vote was 54 - 35 for the investigation, with only six Republicans supporting it, and thus fell short of the 60 votes needed.  This is just as disturbing as the attempted coup itself.  It shows that the coup is not over, but is still in process.

If Congress can’t even act in a bipartisan way to investigate the people who literally tried to kill the Vice President and Speaker of the House, there is no chance at all that this Republican Party will ever be bipartisan.  (Of course, a few Republicans have a lot to fear from an investigation because they were part of the attempted coup by conducting advance tours of the Capitol to give the insurrectionists a chance to case the place for their violence the next day, and some of them also communicated with the assassins as to where the Speaker and the Vice President were during the violence itself.)

And, indeed, the former guy is literally threatening the lives of any who contradict his Big Lie, according to Liz Cheney former number three Congressperson in the House who was deposed by a public voice vote in order to please their mob boss leader of the Party in Mar-a-Lago.

So, I think it is time to end the filibuster rule that requires a 60% vote in the Senate to pass any legislation.  The filibuster is not in the Constitution.  The Constitution expected that both the Senate and the House would have votes decided by a majority, not a supermajority.  The filibuster has a sordid past in that it was most often used by white supremacist southern Democrats to stop civil rights legislation. All they need is to keep the votes short of the 60 votes required to end the filibuster to stop anything. And it has become a way for the minority to rule the country. (By the way, the population of the Republican red states is about 42 million less than the population of the blue Democratic states)  It is now used by as few as 41 Republicans to block all Democrat bills.

The filibuster is unconstitutional and should be abolished in the Senate.

Trump threatens to kill Republican elected officials

 It is not a joke, Trump and his deranged cult actually threaten the lives of Republican lawmakers, according to Liz Cheney being interviewed last weekend:

"On ABC’s This Week, Cheney also repeated the information she gave last week: that Republicans were afraid to convict Trump in his second impeachment trial because they were frightened for their lives."

 Liz Cheney, of course, was the third ranking Republican in the D.C. House of Representatives who was forced out of that position with a voice vote (not by a secret ballot).  She is in position to know the deadly truth of that statement.

The common wisdom was that the cowardice of the elected Republicans was fear of losing their jobs, fear of being Primaried by a Trump Cult figure.  But, fearing for one's life is even more astonishing.  We saw for ourselves the Trump Cult force their way into the Capitol in an insurrection to overthrow the election on January 6 of this year.  Five people died - Died - Died.  We heard them call out to find Vice President, Mike Pence, and Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, to do them harm, and we saw the hangman's noose and gallows outside the building prepared for their necks. 

The Trump Cult has brought this violence and threat of violence to our democracy.  It is time for those who have been voting for Republicans to just turn away from the people who are extreme, violent, and dangerous. 

This is very disturbing.   

Trump wins over Cheney? How authoritarianism works

Discouragingly, Congresswoman Liz Cheney was stripped of her number 3 position in the U.S. House of Representatives yesterday for having the audacity to tell the obvious truth that Trump lost the election and it was not stolen by Biden.  But Trump says the election is stolen, and the Reps in the House were forced to agree with him.  So, Trump won.  Initially.  A couple of thoughts.

First, we are being given real time lessons in authoritarian rule. On March 2, 2016, after Trump won the Super Tuesday primary elections on the way to his nomination by the Republican Party I wrote that America had been lucky and had not lost its innocence, i.e. had never been under authoritarian rule.

"America has been very, very lucky so far.  We have not been guilty of electing monsters to be our leaders. There have been many presidents that have engendered a lot of opposition, but none have been actual monsters.

Other countries have to live with a past that includes monsters.  Italy had Mussolini (whom Trump consciously or unconsciously mimics in his face and body language); Italy also had Caesar; Russia had Stalin, (and Lenin, and Peter the Great, and now Putin), China had Mao Tse Tung (and a few thousand years of brutal rulers); Japan had crazed generals; and of course Germany had Hitler.  These countries all lost their innocence long ago.  They were seduced by authoritarian leaders who became monstrous despots..."

Well, America lost its innocence when it elected Trump, and empowered the monstrous Trump Cult, especially the White Supremacist and conspiracy mongers who are violent and dangerous.  And, even though the Former Guy never got above 46% of the popular vote he holds Republican elected officials firmly in his power via fear.

So, we see how the tyrant establishes his tyranny.  At least 95% of the elected Republicans in the House of Representatives know the obvious truth that the election was not stolen and that all that happened was that the Former Guy lost.  But, they are forced to lie.  The tyrant destroys the will and the spirit of his subjects by forcing them to say and do things against their own consciences - by forcing them to say things that they know are not true - by forcing them to lie.  Once they go along with the Big Stupid Lie they have lost their willpower, lost their integrity, lost their Spirit, and have bent their knee to kiss the ring of their Master.  For the ELECTED Republicans, Trump is their Master. (By the way, I believe the same can be said of the Former Guy himself as he has a long history of bending the knee and kissing the ring of his Master, Putin)

Secondly, one of the biggest losers in the history of American politics has managed to buffalo his party into following him without question.  Where is he leading them?  I still believe his is leading them off the cliff into oblivion, just as the white supremacist slave owners led the Whig Party into oblivion in the mid 1800s.

It's not pretty to watch. And a lot is being destroyed as he and his lemmings charge so bravely and at such full speed toward the cliff of irrelevance.  But, I think more and more actual Republicans will follow my path and just leave the Republican Party, and leave that party to the white supremacist, white grievance folks like Ted Cruz and Rand Paul, and Marjory Taylor Green and Lauren Boebert.  Just ugliness, whining, and threats - not exactly a dream of a positive future for America.

Russian Cyber warfare

 After reading the book "This is How They Tell Me the World Ends" I wrote that Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran are all at war with America - cyberwar.  And we do not have superiority in fighting this war.  Our missiles, aircraft carriers, bombers, tanks, etc. - all marvelous improvements for future WWII type conflicts do not protect us from Cyber attacks.  

Russia has struck America with a cyber attack by shutting down the biggest gasoline pipeline in our country, run by Colonial Pipeline.  Russia invaded America's infrastructure about a year ago and are into our electric grid, power plants, nuclear power plants, Pentagon, Media organizations, etc. etc. with an attack labeled "Solar Winds".  If they can shut down a pipeline, couldn't they blow up a chemical plant? or a refinery? or a nuclear power plant?

We have identified the attack from a Russian Cybercrime outfit using an attack called DarkSide.  Is there any doubt that Putin and the Russian government are not part of this attack?  

By the way, isn't Putin Trump's good friend?  Didn't Trump eliminate the National Cybersecurity Coordinator position in 2018?  And didn't Trump purge the Homeland Security Cyber Division in 2019?  And didn't he fire the National Cybersecurity Director in 2020?  Isn't it pretty obvious he did this at the command of his master, Vladimir Putin?  Doesn't the deliberate weakening of America's cyber defenses open us up to Russian control?  Isn't Putin a very happy man to have such a dupe under his control in the former president?  

We are very vulnerable, as this attack on our gas distribution shows us.  It would be so nice if the Trump Cult came to the realization that their political god is on the side of America's enemies.  Maybe they can have an awakening while waiting in long lines to get gas.

Greed and Bigotry

After the 2020 election I predicted that the Republican Party was on the path to splitting and disappearing, just like the Whigs did in the mid-1800s.  We are watching that now as Lynn Cheney, third ranking Republican in the House of Representatives, insists on telling the obvious truth that Trump lost the election to Biden and it was not stolen from him.  This is seen as heresy to the Trump Cult and they are in the process of stripping her of her position.  Trump is winning the first round of the Republican Party battle, and almost all elected Republicans find that they have little choice but to agree to the Big Stupid Lie that the election was stolen.  

If Trump represented some form of conservative ideology in opposition to orthodox Republican ideology this battle wouldn't be just an exercise in insanity, but there has never been any kind of Trump ideology, just a collection of moments of tweeting, off the cuff improvisations, and cruelties that the Trump Cult took as some kind of revelation from their demented god that must be swallowed whole and regurgitated ad nauseum into the right wing media fantasy bubble.

The only cohesion in the Trump mind is greed and bigotry.  Toss in endless cruelty and a total ignorance of what trade deficits mean, and that pretty much summarizes Trump and the Trump Cult.

So, will there be a split-off party from the Republican Party?  It looks like Trump sees no reason to start a third party since he clearly owns the Republican Party.

Will the not-insane-Trump-Cult-Republicans start a third party?  They would know that it could not win much since splinter parties never do, but some principled folks may do so out of their own sense of self respect and hope to plant the seed for the future on the pretty good bet that the Trump Cult Republican Party is doomed to more and more ignominious and disgraceful failure.

A party based on Greed and Bigotry is just a repeat of the oldest sin in American history, which just never seems to go away, the sin of White Supremacy - manifest as the slave owning South, and as the catastrophic Confederacy led Civil War, and as the Jim Crow terrors in the South, and as impassioned opposition to Women's Suffrage (they couldn't let "negro" women vote since that would "be the end of White Supremacy" as intoned by a Mississippi Senator at the time), and as the appalling voter suppression and gerrymandering by Republican White Supremacists across many states today.

I am betting that a political party based on greed (for the super-wealthy) and bigotry (for all beer bellied flag waving troglodytes) is not a party that has a long history in this country - the country based upon the glorious visions of Jefferson and Lincoln - a country destined to be like a "shining city on a hill" as expressed by President Reagan during his time.

It is hard to watch the depths the that the Republican Party, which I once belonged to, is sinking to, but I guess that is what is needed to finally kill off the cruel, racist, polluting, misogynistic, party of ignorance, greed and bigotry.  I just hope they are thwarted in their dedication to harm as much of the environment and as many human beings as they can before they become just sad footnote in future history books.

Democracy will triumph against autocracy

 President Biden gave his first State of the Union speech last night and laid out his vision for America's future with a heartfelt sincerity and optimism that was very refreshing after enduring four years of narcissistic complaints, blame, whining, and attacks from the former guy.

His primary message, it seemed to me, was that America's democratic system is being challenged by autocrats around the world. He called out the autocratic nations of China and Russia in particular and noted that they are trying to prove to the world that democracy isn't strong enough, and cannot respond quickly enough to compete with the rule of autocracy in today's world.

Biden firmly disagrees, and he calls the nation to regain its footing and rise to the challenges of today.

He did not explicitly call out the greatest autocratic threat to America's democracy - Trump and the Trump Cult of authoritarian white supremacist and Evangelical extremists and terrorists here at home (although he did say he would respond to the white supremacist terrorists in America).  

It is clear to me that the threats from autocrats, from abroad and at home, are a real issue, and and I am very happy to know that this administration sees the issue and opposes the autocracies rather than embraces and emulates them as the former guy did.

A breath of fresh air, a breath of honor and decency and humanity, and a commitment to place America as a leader of the world as an ally, as a moral leader, as a champion of democracy, and as its proper role as the hope of the world.

Tyrants refuse to deal with the Coronavirus

Why do tyrants refuse to follow the science to stop the Coronavirus?  India's Modi is a left wing tyrant, Bolsonaro is a right wing tyrant, Trump tried to be a right wing tyrant, etc.  

I think it has to do with tyranny itself. The tyrant cannot allow anyone to think there are people in his government nor in his country that should be listened to at all. The tyrant sets himself up as the final authority on all matters. And, tragically, that includes pandemics.  So, Trump attacked Fauci, the top immunologist in America, and tells his cult followers to avoid masks and don't follow social distancing guidelines, and by the way they don't have to worry about vaccines.  So over half a million people died of the pandemic while he was telling people that everything was OK.

India and Brazil are in a nightmare now with not enough oxygen, ICU beds, etc and are overwhelmed by this deadly and terrible plague.  I haven't followed either tyrant closely but I do recall that India had millions of people crowded together during a holy celebration day, Kumb Mela.  I don't know what superspreader events happened or are happening in Brazil, but I believe that Bolzonaro himself makes it a point to appear without mask at political rallies with unmasked crowds.

So, why?

The tyrants seem to think that keeping people away from each other will harm their economies and I guess there is nothing worse to the tyrant than short term harm to their economies.  Somehow, they don't seem to understand that explosions of the pandemic shuts down their economies much worse than preventative cautions.

So, the tyrant frames the science precautions as some kind of attempt to steal people's freedoms. As if telling a drunk that he can't drive is robbing him of his freedom rather than protecting all the rest of us from being killed by him.  Or they play up the very tiny chances of abreactions to the vaccines, even though the harms and risks are very significantly less than the harms and risks of the disease itself.  

The reaction of tyrants to the pandemic makes no sense to me at all.

Why the Big Lie?

Trump lost the 2020 election by a big margin - Biden 51.33% (81,009,468) Trump 46.96% (74,111,419) - 306 to 203 Electoral College votes.  Most people would say that Biden won by 4.37% (51.33 - 46.96 = 4.37%), but a clearer picture is to say that 9.3% more people voted for Biden than Trump (51.33/46.96 = 1.093).

BUT, Trump put out the most ridiculous lie in American history, that he actually won the election and that he won it by a landslide.  And, Republican politicians are saying that his Big Lie is true, and the Trump Cult appears to, or simply pretends to, believe the Big Lie.

Why?

Why say that Trump lost because the Democrats cheated?  A couple of reasons.  There are enough dumb, or brainwashed, or hopelessly polarized Republicans to believe it enough to CONTRIBUTE millions of dollars to Trump and his Republican politicians.  And enough of them to SUPPORT Trump Cult media personalities and make them very wealthy indeed.

BUT, there is a bigger reason - THEY GET TO CHEAT IN 2022/2024/2026 etc.....

Trump thought he was going to lose in 2016 so he proclaimed ahead of time that he wouldn't accept the result - then to his shock he won.

Trump knew he would lose in 2020 so he proclaimed ahead of time that he wouldn't accept the result - why? SO HE COULD CHEAT IN 2024. 

And, the entire Republican Party is passing laws at the state level to keep blacks, browns, and reds away from the polls. They get to pretend that it is fitting to do so because, as their Cult Leader told them over and over and over again, he only lost because the Democrats cheated, so they get to cheat TOO.

And, of course, the Republicans have been on a decades long project to gerrymander the states so that they can lose state house popular votes yet still get more state house representatives and send more Reps to Washington and pass more Jim Crow voter suppression laws.

First principles of propaganda - Tell the Big Lie - Repeat Repeat Repeat Repeat - Accuse the other of doing exactly what you are actually doing - Instill as much fear into the populace as you can.

It is not just Trump.  The Cult was ready to mobilize behind him and are trying to dominate once again.

And they will fail, because of a couple of things.  First the Trump Show has grown old and the ratings are way down; Second there is no Trump Successor - one who is already a celebrity and dumb enough, unprincipled enough, and insane enough to be Trump 2.0.  He is a one off and the show is over.

The Republican Party is desperate to cheat because they have nothing else they can do.  It's all over except the shouting but there will be a lot of shouting.  

Oh well.

The Real War

I just finished one of the three most important books I've ever read - "This is How they Tell Me the World Ends" by Nicole Perlroth.  The other two were "Gulag Archepelago" by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn which I read in the '80s and which revealed in terrifying detail the totalitarian control of lives under the Soviet Union (a tradition kept alive to some degree in Russia under Putin), and "The Fifth Risk" by Michael Lewis which demonstrated Trump's attack on the U.S. government by driving scientific and diplomatic expertise out of the government (the Fifth Risk was the risk we didn't know was coming - and the COVOD19 was just one of the unforeseen risks that came that our government was crippled in dealing with - Cyber Warfare is the one discussed in this book)

Nicole Perlroth's sobering book is revealing that we are in the middle of a war, and we are just hanging on by the skin of our teeth - the Cyber War.  

Our military is amazingly powerful - for fighting future WWIIs - planes, missiles, bombs, tanks, ships, automatic weapons, etc.   But why bother bombing a city of an enemy when all you have to do is shut down the power grid via Cyberwarfare.  No power, no gasoline, no money, no food.  Everyone turns on each other trying to survive and most of them die.  Why bother sending a missile to take out refineries of chemical plants if you can just take over the control systems remotely and blow them up?

Russia is in our power grids and can shut them down.  Are we in theirs?  Probably.

Russia is in our nuclear power plants and can take over the controls and force them to explode - a nuclear bomb but spewing almost infinitely endless radiation into the nation.  Are we in theirs?  Probably.

Russia is in our refineries and chemical plants and can open or close valves, shut down or overspeed to destruction pumps and compressors, and cause them to explode.  Are we in theirs?  Probably.

Russia is in our hydroelectric dams and can open them up to flood the areas downstream.  Are we in theirs?  Probably.

They are in the PLCs (Programmable Logic Controllers) that control all the valves, turbines, motors, safety devices etc etc.  If you control those you can destroy anything.

Someone is in hospitals and can shut them down, and someone already has shut down hundreds of them with Ransomware.  

It's not just Russia.  China, Iran, and North Korea are already inside much of the U.S. cyberworld. And they are not friendly visitors.  

I think that China is more interested in stealing technology so they can become the emerging economic and military power.  We know China has stolen billions of dollars of intellectual property.  

I think North Korea is more interested in stealing money that they desperately need.  We know North Korea has extorted many millions of dollars to keep its economy from collapsing.  The company I work for was hit with a ransomware attack and we could not use our computers for a couple of weeks.

I think Russia is most interested in destroying America and thereby destroying democracy around the world so as to cripple world wide opposition to its despotic rule.

Incredibly, the former president seems to have been doing his best to enable his "friend", Vladimir Putin, to attack our cyber world.  He astonishingly eliminated the role of Cybersecurity Coordinator, the job of stopping the attacks, in 2018.  All to please his master, Vladimir Putin and aid in Putin's attacks on America and the American elections.

Astonishingly, the Republican majority leader, Mitch McConnell in 2020 refused to support any election security bill regardless of how bipartisan it would be - so Russia did its best to repeat its efforts to elect the Former Guy in 2020 - and failed, blessedly.

The cyber Rubicon was crossed by the U.S. and Israel with Stuxnet, a cyber attack on Iran's nuclear centrifuges destroying them and setting back their march toward The Bomb.  It was for a good cause.  But, that opened the door for international Cyber War by all parties.  

And all are having a real party, indeed.