Without Excuse (Part Three.)

For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: ~Romans 1:20

My workplace started shutting down yesterday afternoon. I got the call right about 24 hours ago from the time I started typing this. I went in early, at 9:00 P.M. last night, and as of 5:06 A.M. this morning I'm off from work for two weeks, with pay, because of Coronavirus. I'm stocked up on all the stuff I need, and in point of fact I shouldn't have to go anywhere until Friday...because that's payday.

A lot of the credit for this is due to the governor of my state, Gretchen Whitmer, and to the tribal council of the tribe I work for actually being ahead of the curve and prepared for once.

And all things considered, I've not seen so much as a single damn reason in this whole mess, for either bigotry against Chinese people, or for misogyny, but then I'm not a conservative anymore either. Given how little of anything else even from their own supposed value system that conservatives bother to preach, let alone observe, these days...I don't think it's unreasonable to believe that bigotry and hate and misogyny are all that modern conservatism has left itself to stand on.

But it's worse than that, it really is. Given the opportunity to publicly stand up for other stuff, like all the values they used to espouse, let alone their claimed preference for getting results...Conservatives have almost universally declined such in favor of bigotry and generalized meanness. The only two things they appear to care about are shouting "FUCK YOU!" at literally everybody else and following it up with "Give me money."

I spent most of my life as a conservative and I can't support that. Not only that, but this whole "Fuck you, pay me" ethos of modern Republicanism turns me off to such a degree that I'm ashamed I ever was a Republican, or a Christian, or a conservative...and they've made any number of other things that I am or once was into things that it grates on my nerves whenever somebody brings it up.

Why?

Because instead of calling out bigotry when they see it...like I was taught to do as a kid way back when I was in Christian schools and being raised up in a moderately conservative family...Very Serious People like Erick Erickson respond by shouting "YES!!!" like 1980's teenagers when they see a post about people making racist comments right to a person's face would not have gone over well.

I am here to tell you that if I would have said something that's being said by White House Officials today, way back 35 or 40 years ago when I was learning this stuff I'd have got at least one ass whuppin. If I'd have said it at school I sure would have, my Mom would have got a call, a note would have been sent home and I'd get my butt beat as soon as my Dad got home, at least. I'd probably have got my moth washed out with soap, too. Oh, and in 1980, in the Baptist school I was attending at the time...we had a Chinese student and a Korean student, they were my friends...and in the case of the Chinese kid, my neighbor. That kid and his dad would sometimes go fishing with me and my Dad, or we'd all go to the gun range...and his mom worked with my mom at the church school.

He lived around the corner, next to some other friends of ours...the back end of his family's mobile home faced the side of ours and his yard was a place I could go. The people on the corner had this big gray Giant Schnauzer named Schnapps that our little group would give Milkbones to try to get him to stop barking when he was outside and we were playing in the big grassy space between my parents mobile home and the back ends of all the ones on the next street. Eventually, we figured out something that did work. Throw the ball....then throw it again, and again...

During the yearly Christmas thing at the church one year, he read some Bible verses...naturally from Luke, chapter 2, in Chinese. I remember, because I was one of the kids who followed up by reading them in English.

These are simple things, but they're things I remember. Half-forgotten like much of that early Christian education, but like that education these are things that serve as an anchor to my soul. It's stuff like this...and specific lessons and sayings from the people who taught me this stuff...that tell me not to be a crowd-follower in this day and age, and that first put it in my head that things like racism and misogyny were wrong.

It's funny how rarely one ever hears Christians preach about right and wrong these days...and telling what they do talk about if they do it.

It's a simple thing, yes, but let me teach you something that the Baptists taught me.

Jesus loves the little children
All the children of the world
Red, brown, yellow
Black and white
They are precious in His sight
Jesus loves the little children
Of the world

Jesus died for all the children
All the children of the world
Red, brown, yellow
Black and white
They are precious in His sight
Jesus died for all the children
Of the world.

Jesus rose for all the children
All the children of the world
Red, brown, yellow
Black and white
They are precious in His sight
Jesus rose for all the children
Of the world

It's really as simple as that...and you don't actually have to have the same foundation in Christianity that I do, to not be a total dickbag about this stuff. There's a million different ways to not be an asshole.

Makes you wonder, doesn't it, just what all these shitty people who call themselves "Christians" really expect would happen if Jesus came back and saw their rampant mistreatment of others?

I suspect some people are going to be very surprised where they end up in the afterlife.

If we want to have a better world, yes, we have to be better people. In fact, I'd argue that this is exactly what God expects of us.

Without Excuse (Part Two.)

For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: ~Romans 1:20

Sunday and yesterday, Republicans were urging...in some cases demanding...that other people go out into the streets despite the virus because something something Gazpacho own the libs har de har har. Fuck these motherfuckers.

I'm just gonna say this one more time, for the slow people in the back and/or those who are just now catching on to what goddamned awful people all too many modern Republicans are...welcome to the party, pal.

If you think these fucking people believe in God, or at least, God as conventionally understood by most of the rest of us, you have another thing coming.

See, these fucking people think (at best) that God is just as much of an asshole as they are. At worst, He's just a con that they use to get Man's approval for their criminality, scams and shitty agendas.

Some of us figured out this shit years ago. And yes, they are just plain terrible fucking people...either actively in the case of people like David A. Clarke or Mitch McConnell, or passively in the case of their enablers like Cory Gardner or Susan Collins. I mean, seriously, if you're such a coward that you're afraid of people like them...or like Trump for that matter...for fuck's sake, don't go into politics, stay off social media, and be careful leaving the house.

Listen, speaking as somebody who was a moderate conservative Republican for two thirds of his life, I'm here to tell you that I really don't know where this "Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die" mentality that these fucking people suddenly have is coming from.

As with so many things, this is simply not what I was taught, not just about politics...but about life.

The only thing I really can say about that is that I think they know they've been exposed, they know the gig is up and they're trying to get while the getting is good and take as many people with them as they can, simply out of pure spite.

See, Republicans don't give a fuck about you, or me. Hell, they really don't even give a fuck about other Republicans, if you think about it.

Of course, there are those who are simply cruel, or sociopaths, or who for various reasons worship the idea of the Apocalypse...and I'm here to tell you that damned few of the actual Apocalypse worshipers really are the End Times Prophecy Movement Christians or the Rapture flunkies.

Far more of them are the misogynist assholes who want civilization to collapse because they think women will have to have sex with them then, or the Zombie Apocalypse nerds, or various and assorted gun nuts who think there's something good about going out in a blaze of glory.

A lot of these people, though, are the apathetic basically secular nominal-conservatives who are just frustrated by society in general and think somebody needs to chlorinate the gene pool. There's a lot more of this last group than you might think...or at least there used to be. It's those people who see Coronavirus as some kind of a chance for their spiteful dreams to come true. Of course yes, some of those people are racists or whatever. I'd go so far, however, as to say that most are not. You have to care, if you want to hate. A lot of these people simply don't believe in much of anything...except that they should be able to do what they want. Oh, and fuck you for telling them they can't. They don't actually care about the reason, they just want to do what they want to do, when they want to do it, and they're utterly oblivious to the fact that sometimes, not everybody has the power to be that way. In fact, they simply don't see that...mostly because they don't really see other people. It's not that they don't see them as people...it's that they don't see them at all.

As the common internet observation goes "I don't know how to explain to you that you should care about other people."

Tucker Carlson is, fundamentally worried that Coronavirus might cause him to have to pay more in taxes or do something to support people he maybe doesn't like.

Most of the rest of us are worried about the possibility of millions of deaths, or at least have the sense to worry about our own.

I mean, does any of this crap really matter if you're dead?

And that, right there, is the part that I really don't understand. While it can certainly be argued that a lot of this mess can be traced to a generational, sublimated fear of death among Baby Boomers, far too many "Conservatives" are simply acting like they think it will never happen to them, that they will never die, that things will never change. Somehow, they think, Donald Trump will live forever and always be the President.

Bitch, I'm here to tell you, things, they're gonna change. Not just that, conservatives, but your own behavior (especially in light of this crisis) is going to guarantee it.

When the people who most consistently and loudly espouse the ideas of God and religiosity and who most enthusiastically preach political and social Conservatism AS Christianity...as if they are one and the same...are the same people who first and most flagrantly act as if it's all crap and we're all damned anyway and who cares so long as you have comfort and power and wealth in this life...I don't know why they are or ever would be surprised that people are believing in other faiths or even trying to find meaning in other things altogether.

All a better line of bullshit gets you is caught lying at a later date. If you want to have a better nation or a better world, you have to be better citizens, and yes, better people.

Without Excuse (Part One.)

Build cohesive teams through mutual trust.
Create shared understanding.
Provide clear intent.
Exercise disciplined initiative
Use mission orders.
Accept prudent risk.
~U.S. Armed Forces Principles Of Command.

Donald Trump said "I don't take responsibility" regarding Coronavirus, just a few days ago.

Yesterday, my Mom texted me, wanting to know if I was prepared and if my work has done anything to plan or prepare for this or if I will be paid if they have to shut down. Yes to all of the above, thank God.

The only bad spot on this whole thing is a lingering cough from when I had the flu a couple weeks ago. THAT in fact was what told me I had to make some kind of effort to prepare for this mess, when our government was still totally in denial.

You know, in the military, if you are in command, you are responsible for everything that happens on your watch. You are responsible for how you and those under your command react to any developing situation, and if you fail in your responsibilities and manage to survive, yes, you can be held to account because you are responsible.

By the same token, respect is earned, by every action, every day. It's a 24-7-365 thing. If you are to expect people to put their lives at risk at your command, instantly and without argument or debate, they have to trust you. Likewise, it's on you to be respectable, and to be somebody that they can trust to do that. It may sound like a contradiction in terms, but you'd be surprised how often you have to make people feel safe enough to be brave.

By that measure, Donald Trump proved himself to be a failure a long time ago.

Because, really, without such efforts, courage is surprisingly rare. If we've learned anything from the Trump era, it probably should be that.

Sorry to say this, but if you're the President you have to expect people are going to be brave if you tell them they should be. Trump has repeatedly shown that he simply doesn't understand the concepts of courage, or leadership or respect.

And in the face of such a lack of leadership, people's base nature comes flooding in to fill the gap.

At some point yesterday evening, AOC reiterated a warning for people to avoid crowds, and stay at home.

Whatever one may think of AOC, she's literally far from the only person saying this...pretty much all medical professionals and anybody with anything to do with public health and safety, not to mention anybody at risk or who has to care for at-risk people is saying.

Naturally, some dumb-shit Trump Supporter from Nevada responded "This is America, and I'll do what I want." It's as if she thinks she is responsible for nobody but herself, and certainly at best she has a child's idea of what freedom is. I should point out that this person is running for the school board in Clark County, Nevada. Are you fucking kidding me?

As I type this, I have to occasionally stop and pay attention to my disabled ferret, Alaska. Not long after I started working on this article he started cage raging and making a fuss, demanding his daily back-scratch. His hind legs don't work very well and he can only bend so far, which restricts his mobility and ability to groom himself and scratch his itches.

Who is going to take care of him if I get sick and have to go to the hospital or if I die? Who, besides me, even knows the things he needs, let alone would come and feed him and fill his water bowl and clean his cage? If something happens to me, this little guy could die from lack of care or even food and water, while laying in his own shit.

Alaska doesn't know what's going on, and he's deaf so I can't tell him. All he asks of life is full food and water dishes, clean litter to poop in, a warm place to sleep and some attention and time out of his cage on a daily basis. It takes so little to not put him at risk, and that's too much for people?

I'm a couple bags each ahead on food and litter, and hoping like hell everything is still open on Friday so that I can stock up more on stuff, starting with pet foods and ferret litter, just in case. I can go without, they can't.

And that is only one of the simplest, smallest things I have to worry about right now. I'm hardly alone, and I know it. Fuck you "I do what I want" irresponsible "Conservatives."

One of my friends has to care for his disabled mother, and the two of them often depend on me for transportation to and from doctor's appointments and such. For that matter, I have a car, so if local public transport is shut down, even more people might depend on me for basic shit.

Understand yet, just what the hell people are up against here? Everything in our society depends on people continuously doing stuff, if that stuff stops being done, things start going wrong immediately.

Apparently, for too many people, the survival of others pales in comparison to their own needs for instant gratification of their baser urges.

And it's hard as hell to even find out for sure if you ARE sick at this point?!

Do you see what the problem is here, yet?

We aren't going to make it, if the only people who are concerned about this virus and our response to it are liberals, moderates and never-Trump conservatives. It seems like at least a third of us are willfully putting themselves at risk...or even ideologically trying to ignore all that is going on, and they're being egged on by the President...and these people seem to be hoping that this virus is going to take out more of the people they don't like, than it is of them...but they're the ones taking all these stupid risks and putting everybody else at risk in so doing?

How in the fuck does that make any sense?

Let me see if I have this right?

The people who have spent decades preaching morality, probity, prudence, religiosity and sober consideration before taking action...have become nothing more than the people throwing all caution to the wind and doing what they want to do in the midst of a major crisis, and the rest of us be damned.

And of course because those fucking people are responsible for electing much of our current government...of course the government's response is simply going to be "Bend over, insert head firmly into rectum." Do I have this right so far?!

Ya know, if people care so little about the things they can see...how do they feel about the things they can't see? Just sayin.'

For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: ~Romans 1:20

Listen, ya'll, if you want to have a better country...or even stay alive at this point...you have to be better citizens. You have to care about other people, and other creatures. It really is that damn simple.

40 Republicans voted to kill you.

Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven.

Therefore when thou does thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. ~Matthew 6:1-2

40 Republicans voted against the Families First Coronavirus response package.

40 Republicans voted to leave every American affected by Coronavirus twisting in the wind. Had House Democrats not convinced Trump and a decent share of their Republican fellow Representatives to sign on, more would have. Doubtless, an unnecessarily-large percentage of Senate Republicans will also vote against the emergency response, because it helps people who aren't rich.

One "Conservative"-authored article that I read called the package a "Liberal Santa Claus" bill.

I've got something that needs to be said.

Fuck these motherfuckers. When they vote on it and decide that they don't have the money to go to war...then, and only then, will I believe their fiscal conservatism is anything more than a handy, socially acceptable way to dress up a desire to hurt people.

I'm sorry, but if my job gets shut down because of the epidemic, I'd rather like to be able to eat. I don't have kids, but I have a dog and ferrets that I need to feed also, and I don't exactly have the money or the space to buy and hoard away vast amounts of stuff, and I'm hardly the only one. If you're a rich white Republican whose job it is to wear a suit and go to meetings all day and occasionally vote on something and you have a problem with that, fuck you.

I have been able to stock up enough for awhile, mostly because I've been doing it for some months against the possibility of Trump fucking up something major, but it's not like I can go any length of time without a paycheck.

There is not one of those damned forty Representatives who deserves the seat their ass sits in.

And of course, the preferred Republican response to the crisis would be a National Day of Prayer.

I'd just kind of like to point out that according to the Bible that I read, if you don't take care of the poor and the sick and try to help people who need it, your public religiosity is basically just so much masturbation.

The entire basis of Christianity is the ultimate sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, the Son of God dying for the Sins of Man. Christians are in turn called to daily, pick up their own cross and follow Jesus, not just to repeat His words, but also to follow His ways.

Tell me something, where does a national day of prayer and voting not to give people emergency leave and virus testing fit in with that program?

Without forgiveness and love and sacrifice, without thinking of others, what is even the point of claiming Christianity?

I mean, without any of that, wouldn't it just be easier to go follow Eckankar, or the Hare Krishnas, or perhaps LaVeyan Satanism?!

Well, except of course for the fact that I've personally seen people from all those groups do humanitarian work and raise money for charitable causes, in the name of their religions or otherwise, with pure intent and because it needed to be done. That puts them one up on Trumpist Republicans.

Ya know, I've met and spoken with and argued theologically against radical Islamists who, had things worked out differently in this life we might've been shooting at each other instead. I've met Satanists who claimed to practice Black Magic, and whose conduct and ways didn't particularly make me doubt such claims. I've met war veterans not only from the USA but from other countries who described to me acts that could, or perhaps should, have been considered war crimes...and some of those people did not seem especially sorry for it. There's a guy I worked with back in the late 1990's that had gone to prison for second degree murder and was on parole. I've met quite a number of people who reject any gods, hell, reject the idea that a God or gods could be anything other than a made up fiction. I have, in fact, by dint of life experience, travel and work, dealt with some pretty fucking nasty people here and there.

But let me tell ya, ain't very many of those people that I've seen actually match the level of callous heartless cruelty and evil nastiness that I currently associate with many Evangelical Christian Republicans who support Donald Trump, and damned few of those people can manage the kind of snarling, snidely evil shit that Tucker Carlson spews every night...or at least they couldn't do it for as long or attract such a large audience nor did they claim they could heal masses of people through their TV sets.

So when I tell you that I think the only valid response to Republicans at this time is "Go fuck yourself" now you know why.

If you want to have a better country you have to be better citizens, and yes, also better people.

This? This ain't it.

Republicans are trying to kill you.

Marcus Aurelius: And what is Rome, Maximus?

Maximus: I've seen much of the rest of the world. It is brutal and cruel and dark, Rome is the light.

Marcus Aurelius: Yet you have never been there. You have not seen what it has become. I am dying, Maximus. When a man sees his end... he wants to know there was some purpose to his life. How will the world speak my name in years to come? Will I be known as the philosopher? The warrior? The tyrant...? Or will I be the emperor who gave Rome back her true self? There was once a dream that was Rome. You could only whisper it. Anything more than a whisper and it would vanish... it was so fragile. And I fear that it will not survive the winter. ~From the film Gladiator

Last night, Trump addressed the nation from the Oval Office. Obviously lying, issuing three policies that were immediately walked back by his own administration, and sniffling like a goddamned Cocaine addict after a binge.

The stock market immediately imploded, and despite an injection of capital from the Federal Reserve, it continues to do exactly that.

This dumb jackass sought to reassure the country, to convince us that "something is being done" and instead, he might as well have just flipped us the bird and told us we could all kiss our asses goodbye.

This morning, Republicans are holding up a package of emergency measures that passed the House, and Moscow Mitch wants to recess the Senate for a couple weeks.

What the hell more evidence do you need, that Republicans are trying to kill you?

Instead of trying to protect the people, Republicans have been trying to protect their profit margins and the stock market...an effort that seems to be failing, mostly because Trump is a dumb shit.

Any democratic nation survives because the people have faith in their government and their leaders...all the people, not just a bamboozled few, not just a cult of personality. Or at least, you have to have a cult of personality that's bigger than 25% to 30% of the population, and ideally to make it work, you have to expand even that because otherwise you don't have the numbers to stay in power.

And at this point, who has faith in Trump? Let me tell you, after watching Sniffles The Clown murder yet another Teleprompter speech last night, I sure as hell don't. I mean, I've never liked Trump and I've always thought he was garbage and doubted his competence. But he seems to have an almost magical hold over a certain type of person...I've just never been one of those people. Trump has always disgusted me. When somebody comes into your awareness by news of their bankruptcy and divorce being splattered all over the news when you're a kid...well, I've just never bought into the idea that Trump was some kind of a genius or even good at business.

But even that base support, which seems to have a hard floor of around 30% is starting to slip. The corporations and the Republicans alike appear to be switching gears to simply try and steal as much as they can on the way out the door...because even some of the sycophants have realized Trump is incompetent and that they backed the wrong horse...and that they're likely going to pay for it.

Denying, conspiracy theorizing and hoping this Coronavirus shit would just go away appears to have been a hell of a bad strategy. As everything from the Kaaba in Mecca to the streets of Washington D.C. empty out, and all the major U.S. sports leagues cancel their seasons...the talking points that this thing is a conspiracy or some kind of hoax perpetrated by the Democratic Party become harder to believe and more farcical.

My general feeling is that Republicans and their benefactors alike are just looking to see who or what they can take down with them, right now. Earlier I saw some dumb shit of a Trump Supporter giving one of my friends a hard time on Facebook, and out of curiosity I followed the link to their page, only to see, two or three memes down "Cancel the 2020 election, that'll cure your Corona Virus."

Except, yeah, dipshit, there's no Constitutional or legal mechanism for doing that...and if we don't have elections, we don't have America. Given the fractured and polarized state of things, any attempt to cancel elections would likely lead to a civil war sooner, rather than later. Anybody want to consider the odds of surviving a war that's going on while a pandemic is raging? I sure don't.

The Trump administration is flailing...and failing...because they've finally hit a crisis where they can'd buy, bully, bullshit, intimidate or lie their way out of it. We're going to find out what these people are made of, and reality is going to find them wanting. You can't "Shock and Awe" a virus. It doesn't give a damn who you vote for or what you look like or where your parents came from. It simply is...and in the case of one this widespread it's a force of Nature.

And if we're not careful, this is going to be what takes us down and leaves two or three countries on the map where this one used to be.

As far as I'm concerned, most if not all of the current political climate has Republicans to blame for it. The only rational, or reasonable response to a Republican at this point is simply "Fuck you."

If they wanted anything else, they should have done the work to be worthy of the power they were given by the people.

That's what democracy is. No wonder Republicans hate and fear it.

If you want a better country, YOU have to be a better citizen.

If YOU want there to be progress, or even an eventual return to normalcy...the best thing we can do, hell the only thing...is to vote the bastards out.

Republicans are now actively trying to kill you.

So it's either "Get involved" or "Vote them out" or lie down in the road and fucking let them.

Republicans are trying to kill you. At least some of them seem to think they're somehow immune to this disease. They won't be.

It's really that damned simple.

Joe Biden, and hope for a post-Malarkey world.

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard. ~H.L. Mencken

Joe Biden won in Michigan yesterday, along with Idaho, Mississippi and Missouri. I'm guessing results from North Dakota and Ohio are still in process.

Cue a whole lot of bitching from the Bernie people.

Yet again, if you want to win, you have to show up and vote. I did, it's not that hard.

Perhaps more to the point, this whole thing proved yet again that social media ain't the real world, and that comfortable, privileged liberals are hardly the whole 'Democratic coalition." In fact, the Biden coalition that appears to be forming up looks an awful lot like the one that Barack Obama assembled in 2007-2008, plus more independents and dissatisfied Republicans. For you kids in the back...yes, you, put your phone away...that's actually a good thing. Democracy is a numbers game, the more people you get...and per our system the more places you get them...the better.

Let me ask you a question: How many of those often-rural Black voters in Mississippi do you suppose have Twitter accounts?

How many senior citizens in Northern Michigan do you suppose post dank memes on Facebook?

Do you suppose that 20-something Native kid in North Dakota (who may actually BE a Bernie voter for all we know, yet) has the time to goof around on Discord or TikTok?

My guess would be, not very many, and no.

And yet...here we are...where a Presidential candidate with a long-established history of being a centrist moderate Democrat is being harangued about some stupid "viral video" shit by...a middle-aged white Republican dude.

That's who all the internet-activism bullshit is reaching...and why it matters is, I guarantee you that dumb ass shows up to vote.

To his credit, Joe told the guy he was full of shit, and told him to stop acting like a horse's ass.

More of this, please.

Let's go over this again. I don't give a damn what your "viral video" said, the Second Amendment is a part of the Bill Of Rights, the first ten amendments to the Constitution of the United States. It takes an Amendment to alter or remove an Amendment (See also "Prohibition.") You can propose whatever the fuck you want...but you have to get that shit by both houses of Congress with 75% in favor, the President has to sign off on it, and then you have to get it passed by three quarters of the states...some of which absolutely will put it to the popular vote. (See Also: Equal Rights Amendment.) It's hard to amend the Constitution for a damn reason, and then there's the ongoing task of the courts interpreting it and if you think anybody's going to slip some kind of a blanket gun ban by the Conservative legal-industrial complex, you're on some pretty good drugs.

Joe Biden, or for that matter Bernie Sanders or Marianne Williamson, can go ahead and think or advocate for whatever they want...but those are the facts.

But more to the point, nobody on the Democratic side is...or to my knowledge, ever has been trying to do this.

In our society right now there is way the hell too much tolerance for bullshit and conspiracy theories and drunk-uncle racism. Despite the vast amount of partisan rancor that seems to exist...particularly on the Republican side...lots of people are still way too conflict-averse, and thus bad actors get away with more bullshit, more misinformation gets spread, etc.

And the "neutrality" and "objectivity" fads that extend from the media on down don't help much.

If you take the time to explain things to a lot of these yahoos you're going to lose, because frankly there's a hell of a lot of them, and that's exactly how they wear you out. No. You have to have the guts to tell people that come at you with bad information, misinformation and outright lies "Do you really believe that crap? What the fuck is wrong with you?!"

As somebody once said, if you're explaining, you're losing.

It's been my experience...and I deal with this on a nightly basis...that a lot of these old white conservative dudes that I work with simply don't retain information that well. You can give them the information and tell them the truth and hope they'll evaluate things properly and do the right thing. But I'm here to tell you they often won't, or they'll only retain the information until the next time they're sitting zombie-eyed in front of a TV with Fox News playing.

No, sometimes you have to make a value judgment and lay the smack down and tell people "No, that's crap, don't believe it."

Or my personal, and louder, favorite "Where the fuck did you come up with this silly bullshit?!"

Embarrassment can occasionally be a powerful motivator, but more to the point, a lot of these people actually do respect consistency and a person's willingness to hold and defend a set of beliefs, even if they don't agree with it. Some of these old white conservative dudes actually will ask me questions and shit, even though they know I don't agree with them about much.

And as for the rest, you simply cannot reason with unreasonable people, so don't waste your time. You'll get further with calling their viral videos silly bullshit and telling them not to act like a horse's ass in public.

I don't know about you, but I'm kind of hoping we end up with a post-Malarkey wold for awhile after this Trump bullshit is over.

And this feels like a first step.

An Open Letter to MAGA about Coronavirus.

Seek him that maketh the seven stars and Orion, and turneth the shadow of death into the morning, and maketh the day dark with night: that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth: The Lord is his name:

9 That strengtheneth the spoiled against the strong, so that the spoiled shall come against the fortress.

10 They hate him that rebuketh in the gate, and they abhor him that speaketh uprightly.

11 For as much therefore as your treading is upon the poor, and ye take from him burdens of wheat: ye have built houses of hewn stone, but ye shall not dwell in them; ye have planted pleasant vineyards, but ye shall not drink wine of them.

12 For I know your manifold transgressions and your mighty sins: they afflict the just, they take a bribe, and they turn aside the poor in the gate from their right.

~Amos 5:8-12

Dear Trump Supporters;

I wrote a letter the other day, aimed at the Bernie Bros.

You're next.

Listen, ya'll. I know how much it sucks, believe me, I do. But it's time to admit...to yourselves if no one else...that you've been conned, ya got rolled. You got took, and there's no two ways about it.

The first step in dealing with a problem is always admitting that it's there.

Yes, I'll be the first one to tell you that I've always been against Trump. He first came to my awareness because of bankruptcies and divorces, and I've known he was a racist since 1989 when he decided to involve himself in the Central Park Five case.

Note; I was a young conservative at the time, a bit over two years later when I turned 18, I registered to vote as a Republican. I would remain a predominately-conservative swing voter right up until 2008. But this isn't about that, I'm not actually here to debate you nor the morality of your President, at least not directly.

This is a warning. I am here to tell you that Donald Trump does not care about you. He does not give a fuck if you live or die, and his administration's handling of this Coronavirus mess should show that to you.

I may not agree with you about much, or even like you very much, but I don't necessarily want you to die, simply because of my own conscience and because I don't want to live in the kind of country where life or death would ever be dependent on one's politics. I don't, and neither do you. It's really that simple. All around the world, we see footage of Association Football teams playing in empty stadiums, people avoiding close contact, people in masks, etc. etc.

And Trump is here saying "We'll hold tremendous rallies?" Something doesn't add up about that. It seems to me that Trump cares more about his image, and about the idea that the cheers from the people that like him will keep coming.

I understand that, I guess. I was a teenager once, too. Granted I stopped being one by the time I was about 20 years old...unlike some people. But, I do get the impulse.

You'd think that would matter less, in the face of public health and people's lives. You'd think a  leader...somebody who cares about their people...would understand "Hey, I've got to go without, a little bit, so we all can survive."

Instead, Republicans in general, those affiliated with Trump in particular, and Trump himself most of all...have tried to deny the threat and ignore it, hoping it would go away. Now that they can't do that, they're making sure that the response is inefficient, opaque, and slow. It's like they want you to die. We're barely even testing for this disease...and it is here, and a vast number of Americans cannot even afford to stay home from work if they show symptoms of this or any other illness because they have no family or sick leave or even paid time off.

Do you support that? In matters of public health do you somehow not see yourselves as members of the public? Or do you simply believe that it won't happen to you? You know, I'm pretty sure that Iranian health minister believed it wouldn't happen to him, either. Playing politics with things like disaster relief and pandemic response, and wishing and hoping does not make for good government policy. Appeasing corporations who make their business model dependent on low-wage workers with no benefits might be good for somebody's bottom line...but it's abominable public health policy.

I've worked in food service for decades, I know how this goes, but I have paid time off and sick leave, and even in my own workplace that makes me one of the lucky ones, a lot of people don't have paid time off or even a full time paycheck where I work. That's why when I had the flu last weekend, I called off on Monday night, because I didn't want to risk compromising whatever level of immunity pool we have even more. I can afford to do the right thing.

And that shouldn't be on me, employers and our government should be doing more...or at least doing something...about this mess.

COVID-19 is a virus. That is, it's basically not much more than a strand of DNA and the capability to replicate itself, and it makes you sick. It doesn't care if you're a Democrat or a Republican or Black or White or any other damned thing. It just wants to spread, that's what it will do. That's all it does. It can't be bribed or bullied or bullshitted and it doesn't care or even think about you. It was not developed in some secret "Deep State" or "government" lab somewhere, it evolved naturally in some other animal and made the jump to humans because humans ate it. The origin of the disease has been traced back to a huge commercial fish market in Shanghai, China. Nature doesn't care about you or your politics, it simply is, and it's only the hubris of humanity that lets Man think he is above nature somehow.

But witness a storm at sea, or a tornado, or various natural landmarks like the Grand Canyon...or even simply look up at the stars at night and you should know that Man ain't shit, not in the grand scheme of things, he's not.

And I know that is not the message that conservatism likes to have. But it is what's true. For all the puffed up stupid talk of an event like CPAC, those people there...whatever their relative status...are just as capable of getting a disease as you or I can. The elites don't have some kind of magical mojo or special technology that keeps them from getting sick. They just have more money to throw at the problem, usually.

But something like this virus will kill them just as dead as it will kill some poor redneck that doesn't have a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of.

I know from experience that conservatives like to believe that we are in some kind of a just universe where all things work together for good and this, that, and the other thing...but the truth is, that is not the case and it never has been. Money and political power and status can purchase that illusion, but only for the very few at the top.

Thus far, working people like myself are denied such things, and I rather expect you are, too. It's not just that, though. It's that these people are trying to spin this illusion that "something is being done" and "things are under control" not for the sake of protecting the people...but for the sake of the numbers of the stock market...and even the markets aren't buying it. We're effectively in a recession and facing a huge threat and Republicans think it's all about them and blame "The Left" for ginning up all this to try and hurt Trump.

I've got news for you. If "The Left" had that much power, Trump would still be running The Apprentice and I guarantee you that Hillary Clinton or any of the other 2016 Republican candidates would be doing a better job with this mess.

Meanwhile, as our various government agencies fiddle while Rome burns, others are stepping in to try to do the work that those agencies should be doing...and the numbers are getting worse all the time. I guarantee you this problem will not be gone by November, if anything, it's going to be worse by then.

This isn't a time for ignoring things and hoping they'll go away, it's a time for acting and reacting rationally based on data, science, and truth...and on what your eyes and ears tell you, not The Party.

I'm not saying that because I'm not a Republican anymore. I'm saying that because I'm a person who doesn't want to die from this shit..and if I had to guess, deep down I would think you don't want to Kamikaze yourself for somebody else's grandiose, overblown, vainglorious ego either.

Or at least, I'm going to have enough faith in you to presume that you don't.

Have the sense to have some self-preservation, please.

I'm not asking you to not be a conservative. I'm asking you to recognize that a lot of the people who now claim the label simply aren't, and they don't care about you. Consider that Mick Mulvaney got fired last week, and that this President eventually betrays or fires damned near everybody on his team. Not just that, but these people politicize everything, including stuff like this epidemic that it's not appropriate to politicize. This isn't about Trump, it's about you and whether you want to survive or not.

Do you care more about yourself, or about wealthy men who don't give a shit about you and are as much as telling you so right to your face?

They care more about their own power and wealth than they do even about their own survival, much less yours.

A lot of conservatives have been duped into thinking that their fortunes rise or fall with those of Donald Trump, or that Trump is all that stands between them and utter ruin.

The truth couldn't be more different. The truth is, that having a better country isn't about voting for the "right" politician or for whichever deceiver tickles your ears better.

The truth is that if you want a better country, you have to be a better citizen.

The truth is, if we want to beat this epidemic, we have to go by reality and reason and science and know that we can't ignore it or bullshit or politicize our way out of it.

The truth is you can't "Own the libs" if you're dead, and the truth is, that kind of thinking was stupid to start with.

If we want to survive, we have to remember that we're all in this together, we're all Americans.

And anybody that tries to convince you that one is better than the other almost certainly doesn't have either your...or our...best interests in mind. Those who profit from division will only seek to encourage more division.

An open letter to the Bernie Bros.

Nameless One: “Shadow of this life?”

Dhall, Dustman scribe: “Yes, a shadow. You see, Restless One, this life is not real. Your life, my life, they are shadows, flickerings of what life once was. This life is where we end up after we die, and here we remain. Trapped, caged, until we can achieve the True Death.”

Nameless One: “True Death?”

Dhall, Dustman scribe: “True death is non-existence. A state devoid of reason, of passion, of sensation.” [Dhall coughs] “A state of purity.”

Nameless One: Sounds like oblivion, why would anyone would want that? 

~from Planescape Torment

Dear Bernie Bros.

I know a lot of you are upset that Joe Biden came out ahead on Super Tuesday.

I get that. I'm sorry. It happens, I understand that y'all are angry.

And I get that my guy did come out ahead, substantially so, after South Carolina. Do you know why that is? One of the most substantial reasons that Joe Biden is now the Democratic front-runner is because Black voters showed up in droves for him...some of them waited absolutely unreasonable amounts of time to vote for him, too.

Personally, I'm a middle-aged white guy, a former Republican, and I tick a very large number of boxes for what used to be favorable things in Conservatism. Do you know who I voted for in the 2016 Democratic Primary in my state?

Bernie Sanders.

And I didn't get what I wanted, but I voted for Hillary Clinton anyway, because Trump disgusts me and always has. Because I saw him as a threat to this country and many of its people, because duty, honor, and Service Before Self, are not concepts with which I am unfamiliar.

I didn't have to like it. Sometimes you gotta stand and deliver and do what has to be done anyway.

Let me tell you a story.

It was slow at work last night. I work in a casino, it's the middle of the week, and I was in an area that was even more dead. But this customer that I got to know over the holidays and Super Bowl time was there. He was the only person sitting in the dining area all night reading his book and smoking his pipe and I took a few minutes to speak to him as I do when I see him. I went out and emptied his ashtray pretty regular, and wiped the nacho crumbs and stray pipe tobacco bits off his table a few times.

This dude is an elderly African-American gentleman, a Marine Corps Vietnam-era combat veteran and General Motors retiree.

We spoke about books we've each recently read, about health care, about politics a little, and about a shared hatred of war and what is becoming of our nation. When he spoke about being uncomfortable when somebody says "Thank you for your service" I understood as one who is also uncomfortable with this for the same reasons can. We are Americans, not Spartans, not Zulus, and if history has shown us anything it's that freedom and militarism are not compatible. Neither myself nor anyone I ever met served to get thanks from random people who do not know us nor our stories, and who most often do not care. Veterans are people, not objects to be worshiped, with reasons both good and bad, or profound or stupid, for doing what they did.

He said nobody thanked him when he got back from Vietnam. Instead, he was spit on. The one thing I did have to add was to ask, half-rhetorically, half probing a question that was only just developing in my own mind...I asked how many of the young white hippies who spit on him then are the old White conservatives in red hats who want to "Thank him for his service" now?

"Most of 'em" was his immediate reply, delivered with a laugh, but the sort of laugh that tells you it's not really funny. 

This from a dude who has lived in the same city for most of his life. Who had known many of the same people just as long, and who had around the time of the Football post-season pointed out to me that Gerald Ford had once been his Congressman back during the endless political ratfucking of the Nixon era. He said that Gerald Ford never did anything for anybody but Gerald Ford and he still got an aircraft carrier, an airport, a freeway and a museum named after his ass.

This dude hates politics, but of course his race, his life experience, and his previous UAW job meant it is still a part of his life. Yet in the tradition of men of his background and generation he plays his cards close to the chest, saying only "I never voted for no Gerald Ford."

This old man spoke about his father, who served in the Army during World War II, for four years, and in 1946 when he came home after shooting his way through Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia and up the Italian Boot the only job he could get was to be a postal clerk because nobody in private business at the time wanted to hire a Black man and pay him something he could live off of. Can ya'll imagine that? That kind of world is exactly what Donald Trump means when he says "Make America Great Again."

There was a time when Black folks could not travel long distances safely, when a Black family had to be almost ridiculously careful to not be visible as such while traveling, and a job transfer, even for a government job, or a military Permanent Change of Station could mean taking your life into your own hands. Look up the history of the Negro Motorist's Green Book if you don't believe me. I remember hearing a Tuskegee Airman speak about driving from Chicago to visit family in Mississippi in the 1950's. Formal Segregation started in Cairo (pronounced "Caro") Illinois, and that was that. Using the wrong drinking fountain could get somebody arrested, if not murdered.

And then Republicans want to get rid of the US Postal Service...and gut Medicare, Social Security and Veterans benefits...and spread nativism, paranoia, racism and stoke urban/rural divides?

Hell, I know Canadians who are nervous about visiting the United States, at this point.

Do ya'll understand why Black folks, particularly older Black folks, voted in droves for Joe Biden yet?

It's not just his association with Obama, although that helps.

We live in a world right now, where the people that were the little Black kids who integrated schools in the 1950's and 1960's are just now starting to age out, or even reach retirement age and become the old people who wile away the night reading some cheesy novel while their spouse plays the slot machines. We live in a world where Rep. John Lewis, a man with Stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer...can return in triumph to the bridge where he was beaten and tear-gassed as a young activist and stand next to the first Black US President and have all the presidential candidates for his party...save one, that is...have to make the effort to show up.

Because it has to be done, because it's the right thing to do. Service Before Self.

Because the people we stand against would wipe out every last one of those hard-won gains that lawyers like Thurgood Marshall fought for, so those kids could go to school, or for which Rep. John Lewis was beaten, or that my friend served to protect for all of us...so that my generation could watch the fall of the Soviet Union, do our service in peace, if we even wanted to (and most of us did not, and that's Okay) and then see the continuation of social change and the extension of rights to others such as LGBT folks and the recognition of countless new people groups not as less-than to White People, but as full and fellow citizens in their own right. We live in a world where even transgender people are gaining acceptance, much as gay people were 25 years ago.
I was there when Don't Ask, Don't Tell was the new thing, and seen as an amazing improvement over what was there before. Trust me, things are better now.

And there's people who'd piss all that away?! For WHAT?!?

Because your favorite candidate didn't get the nod? If that's the case, fuck you and I'm not sorry.

Because there's people out there who'd rat-fuck you, me, immigrants, non-Christians, LGBT people, People of Color, Jeff Sessions, Mitt Romney and any other White people that they hate and anybody who stands up for our country and Constitution, all alike, out of every human, political and social right we now possess, for Donald Trump? For their own vainglorious hatred? Who can say? But the truth is that is what they want to do.

Jeff Sessions, Roy Moore, and former football coach Tommy Tuberville all alike each ran on how much they loved Donald Trump...and it still wasn't enough to put any of them over the top, there's going to be a runoff election. For the record, Tommy Tuberville is the guy I posted about awhile back who is ranting about "Sharia Law" and Muslims taking over...in Alabama where you can't throw a rock without it hitting a Southern Baptist church. 

By the way, there's plenty of people out there, many of them from Alabama, who think the Southern Baptist Convention has gotten too "Liberal" because there have been efforts, however sporadic, in favor of diversity, racial reconciliation and against sexual abuse within the Church. 

Think about that for a second, and think about what those people would do to the rest of us, given the power.

Think about what those fucking people, those rabid conspiracy theorists, might do with a situation like a major global pandemic on our hands.

Think about what people who don't recognize the Christianity of people like Russell Moore, much less John Lewis...might do concerning public health, and especially with abundant misinformation concerning the virus and its origins, and who they might scapegoat instead of doing proper things like, ya know, protecting the population and trying to find a vaccine or something.

And I've got people trying to tell me that the guy to stop these absolute motherfuckers is some crazy fly-haired old socialist Soviet-sympathizer who believes phantom armies of Progressive voters will rise from the very ground if he gets the nomination...who just managed to offend damned near every single Latino voter in Florida? Many of those voters are Cubans and Central- and South-American immigrants or the descendants of immigrants who fled Communism or Communist-adjacent regimes or insurgent violence...and one hell of a lot of them are, in fact, former members of a solid Republican constituency won over by the Democrats over the last couple of decades through painstaking work and thanks in large part to the open embrace of racism by their former party at the national level. Note that actual Florida Republicans do not appear to be making the same mistake at least not at an institutional level, thus while Florida is considered a swing state in national terms, State-level Democrats always seem to end up playing second fiddle to State-level Republicans...and Bernie has likely damaged Democratic national-party credibility in Florida...especially if he's the nominee.

Remember that Obama won Florida, twice. Bernie has likely made winning it again, at all, harder.

You don't win people who have dealt with things like being driven from their own countries, death, imprisonment, murder and war over to supporting you or your cause by asking them what's wrong with the jailers and the killers. You don't win over people who fled Communism or keep them aligned to your cause by Mansplaining to them the glories of the Soviet Union or by trying to romanticize the very Cuban Revolution that may well have killed their grandparents or persecuted and driven out their parents.

Whether you agree with those people or not, you want to keep them on your side, you have to find some kind of common ground and go from that instead of alienating them...whether you agree with them and their take on the regimes, whether far-left or far-right, that they fled from. Authoritarian regimes of all kinds look largely the same from the perspective of the person staring down the muzzle of a rifle and hoping they don't die.

Telling the trees how great the chainsaw is probably is a bad idea.

That's not a political statement, that's a human statement, and that Bernie Sanders doesn't seem to understand shit like that...and would in fact ask a prisoner held in Cuba "what's wrong with Cuba?" speaks not only of bad political judgement or skills, but of simple failure to human properly.

And that's a risk we can't really afford, not for a guy whose voter base doesn't turn out to vote for him, not for a guy whose authoritarian, dogmatic style and pro-Communist fervor alienate even large percentages of the Democratic voter base.

Hell, one of the Bernie bros I know, damn near all he talks about is how bad the Democrats are. He almost never even says anything about Republicans or attacks them.

That doesn't help anybody.

And I say that as somebody who voted for Bernie Sanders in the 2016 Democratic primary.

The philosophy Bernie and his followers claim is "Not me, Us."

But I'm seeing an awful lot of people who'd gladly throw Us overboard if they don't get what they want. I'm seeing an awful lot of people out there who see in the votes of elders and Democrats of Color some kind of imaginary conspiracy, and people who are literally telling others "Fuck you, fuck your life and your rights if I don't get what I want."

I've seen an awful lot of homophobia, misogyny and even racism under the aegis of "Bernie or Bust."

And ya know what?

There's nothing liberal about that.

If that's how you really feel about your fellow human beings, if that's how you feel about my friend's rights or my Mom's social security or the benefits due our veterans or all of our rights, or the viability of our planet, and you think the rest of us Democrats are so bad...

Why don't you just go vote Republican? That seems to be who you want to win anyway.

Otherwise, you're going to have to deal with the fact that building the kind of world you want is going to be the work of decades, and to even get started, you have to win first, and consistently. But, to win, you have to show up. It's a whole lot less immediately satisfying, I suppose, than kicking over the table and ruining the game for everybody. But it's the right thing to do, it's the only thing we can do...especially if you actually do believe in the things you expend so many words talking about.

We live in a world where the Republicans have gotten so bad that they've lost Clint Eastwood, this should not be this hard to figure out.

It's not actually that I'm so in favor of Joe Biden, or so against Bernie Sanders. It's that I'd vote for an old rusty can full of cigarette butts and cockroaches if that was what was up against Donald Trump. The problem is Trump, he's gotta go. The problem is Republicans, they gotta go.

Until that happens all the Progressive ideas in the world will always be just that, ideas, purity pipe dreams that never go anywhere and lots of people who need help will never get it.

We can disagree about policy until the cows come home, but until you win, until you get the power to implement your policies, they're just so much masturbation. You can disagree with other Democrats without burning the house down around all of us. If we don't stand together, we will fall separately.

And then...you certainly won't get the things you want.

Oblivion in the pursuit of purity ain't my style, and it helps no one.

Cut that shit out and let's get to dealing with the work of life. 

I'm not asking you to like it. I'm asking you to do your duty as a citizen, to not be so selfish that you fail to live up to the values you profess and fail your fellow human beings...some of whose lives actually depend on putting an end to this current national disgrace.

If we really want to have a better nation, we have to be better citizens.

Brothers, sisters, comrades, I am here because I believe you have made a decision with insufficient information and foresight. I am aware of your earlier vote. I am aware that it was unanimous. Nonetheless, I believe we should restore the Springboks. Restore their name, their emblem and their colors, immediately. Let me tell you why. On Robben Island, in Pollsmoor Prison, all of my jailers were Afrikaners. For 27 years, I studied them. I learned their language, read their books, their poetry. I had to know my enemy before I could prevail against him. And we did prevail, did we not? All of us here … we prevailed. Our enemy is no longer the Afrikaner. They are our fellow South Africans, our partners in democracy. And they treasure Springbok rugby. If we take that away, we lose them. We prove that we are what they feared we would be. We have to be better than that. We have to surprise them with compassion, with restraint, and generosity. I know. All of the things they denied us. But this is no time to celebrate petty revenge. This is the time to build our nation using every single brick available to us – even if that brick comes wrapped in green and gold. You elected me your leader. Let me lead you now. 

~Nelson Mandela, as played by Morgan Freeman, Invictus.

#Next5 #Top20