California Free Press

Off the Top of My Head

These Two Things Do Not Compute: Shutting Down the American Government and Lecturing the World About the Virtues of American Democracy

by John Lawrence

The US power structure dominates the world in terms of its military bases. The US controls about 750 bases in at least 80 countries worldwide and spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined. The US also controls the world's financial transactions. The dollar’s role as the primary reserve currency for the global economy allows the United States to borrow money more easily and impose painful financial sanctions. With the US' dominant position in world affairs, you would think that it would be impossible for a handful of representatives in Congress to shut down the entire US government. But that is exactly the situation the US and the world is in. The US is the leader in world affairs. Yet the leader can't even keep the lights on. Other countries are looking at this. Nixon called the US a pitiful, helpless giant. He said, "If, when the chips are down, the worlds most powerful nation, the United States of America, acts like a pitiful, helpless giant, the forces of totalitarianism and anarchy will threaten free nations and free institutions throughout the world." So what is the US when its government shuts down? Exactly that: a pitiful, helpless giant. Its military personnel on the 750 military bases won't get paid. How's that for demoralizing the military? Service members will continue to report for duty, though they will not get paid during a shutdown. And many of the hundreds of thousands of civilians who work for the Department of Defense will likely be furloughed, says White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby. Air traffic controllers will not get paid either although they will be required to report for work as well. Does that portend more close calls at airports?

The world is watching. American diplomats are fond of lecturing other world leaders about the pitfalls and shortcomings of their governments. However, their governments probably would not be caught in the pickle of a complete government shutdown. Nor would the governments of the civilized world, with the exception of the US, contemplate putting a person with 91 criminal indictments into the position of their President. The US is much in the need of updating. It is giving democracy a bad name in the sense that the national dialogue is turning into a clown show. Trump's rallies are providing entertainment for his base which is an audience that is more addicted to being entertained than it is to supporting a leader who is devoted to improving their lives. This reminds me of Hitler's rallies which were designed as pageantry for its entertainment value. It sure enthralled the German people. People are loyal to a leader who entertains them, who moves them, not one who will use the legitimate levers of government to improve their lives or to make the country and/or the world a better place. Joe Biden is the opposite. He has made the country and the world a better place despite not being very entertaining. That's why he's not leading Trump in the poles. Trump's base (cult) are excited by Trump. Biden's base, if you could call it a base, are ho hum. Oh well, I guess he's done some good, but I'm not excited. For Trump's base excitement is the sine qua non.

Getting back to the military NPR reports the following:

Separately, the Department of Defense says post and base services would be closed or limited, while elective surgeries and procedures in its medical and dental facilities would have to be postponed. Commissaries would remain open overseas but close in the U.S.

And certain Pentagon activities, like operational planning and military recruitment, will be paused.

Defense officials warned earlier this week that a shutdown would strategically "play into the hands of U.S. competitors" because it would cost time as well as money. Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh called it "the worst thing that could happen."

"The U.S. military's going to continue to do its job and protect our national security interests, and of our allies and partners as well," she said, adding that a shutdown would make those efforts harder. "When you don't have your full operating capacity to be able to help with the mission, to be able to conduct an exercise or training, of course, that gets to our national security and readiness."

Kirby agrees that a prolonged shutdown could harm national security, especially when it comes to delayed management of DOD contracts for things like maintenance, logistics and procurement.

So five Republican representatives can act collectively as dictators to threaten national security as well as domestic tranquillity, and there's absolutely nothing anybody can do about it. This is democracy in action? This is the vaunted "rule of law"? What exactly is this except a fly in the ointment of democracy or in any system that purports to be a democracy and what does this say about the world's military and financial leader? Other countries are watching this spectacle.

Off the Top of My Head

Should the President Be Popularly Elected by Direct Vote of the People?

by John Lawrence

In the US the President is popularly elected by the people after having been filtered through the archaic electoral college. In a parliamentary democracy the head of government equivalent to the US President is indirectly elected by the parliament not by a direct vote of the people. In China the president is also elected by a majority vote of the National People's Congress, the highest legislative body very similarly to how the heads of government are elected in parliamentary democracies. In Russia the President is nominally elected by a popular vote of the people similarly to the US although the system has been manipulated in such a way as to keep Putin in power. So what are the drawbacks of a popularly elected President by a vote of the people? The main drawback IMHO is that in the US an incompetent but popular boob like Donald Trump can be elected to the most powerful office in the land and arguably in the whole world. The election for President of the US is a popularity contest, and there is no requirement of experience or competency. In parliamentary democracies as well as China, supposedly the indirect election of President or its equivalent, "head of state," is an election by a meritocratic body of lawmakers. Therefore, it is more likely that a competent President or head of government will be elected.

In recent history in the US, the least competent but most popular person has been elected President based more on their personality and charisma than on their competency or knowledge of the job. It is more likely that a guy who "you would like to have a beer with" is elected President than someone who is more experienced and/or intelligent. Adlai Stevenson was branded as an "egghead" which effectively ended his political career. The leading Democratic figure of the 1950s, Stevenson was known for his wit, intellectual speeches, and liberal political convictions. For many Americans in the mid-twentieth century, he symbolized conscience in politics. Stevenson lost the Presidential election twice to Dwight Eisenhower, the World War II war hero. In 2000 Al Gore lost the election to George W Bush who promptly lied the US into war with Iraq. Gore, who was a staunch advocate for climate change mitigation, presumably would have employed government resources in that direction rather than fighting a fruitless war. Gore actually won the popular vote but was defeated by a combination of the Electoral College and the Supreme Court.

Jimmy Carter put solar panels on the White House that were then taken down by Ronald Reagan. So much for science taking precedence over popular ignorance and prejudice. Reagan also ran up the national debt substantially as did George W Bush and Donald Trump. Then when Democrats are elected President, Republicans cry bloody murder over the national debt while doing their best to prevent Democrats from spending any government money to actually help people. Fortunately, Joe Biden has been very successful in getting legislation passed to mitigate climate change among other accomplishments. But, his popularity as a candidate in 2024 in on the line as a majority of the American people don't want him to run again. Trump, despite 91 criminal indictments, is running neck and neck with Biden, one of the most accomplished Presidents in American history. One wonders whether the sclerotic American electoral system can withstand the challenges brought by popular but unscrupulous candidates for the Presidency by those you'd "like to have a beer with." Finally, the electoral College has all the disadvantages of indirect elections and none of the advantages.

No Labels, no fables, no third-party betrayals

All Americans who believe in democracy must unite behind Joe Biden.

Robert Reich

Sep 7, 2023

 

Good morning, friends,

I couldn’t sleep last night. I made the mistake of looking at a lot of voting data before bedtime and then reading some of the BS being put out by the third-party group “No Labels,” as well as by my old friend Cornel West, who’s now running for president as the Green Party candidate. It was a mistake. It’s now 2 a.m. where I am, and I’m loaded for bear.

Let me be absolutely clear. Third-party groups such as No Labels and the Green Party are in effect front groups for Trump in 2024, and should be treated as such.

No Labels has pledged to spend $70 million to support a third-party candidate in 2024 who could easily draw enough votes from President Biden to tip the presidential election to Trump.

 

No Labels has already qualified as a presidential party that can run candidates on the ballot in 10 states, including in both Arizona and Florida. Already, Joe Manchin is flirting with the idea of running as a third-party presidential candidate under the No Labels banner.

If you believe that No Labels exists in order to encourage bipartisanship, I have a bridge in Brooklyn I’d like to sell you.

No Labels — which claims to be a centrist organization — will not reveal its donors, one of whom is reportedly the conservative megadonor Harlan Crow. Politico reports that No Labels has brought on a major Trump donor as an adviser in the pivotal battleground state of Florida.

But whatever it says it aims to be, No Labels will help Trump.

So will every other third party claiming to be in the “center” or on the “left” — including the Green Party, which is already on the ballot in the two key swing states of Michigan and Wisconsin and whose most likely candidate for president is Cornel West. And the People’s Party, especially if Robert F. Kennedy Jr. becomes its nominee.

The reason they’re all front groups for Donald Trump is that the upcoming 2024 election is likely to be nail-bitingly close even as a two-way race between Trump and Biden.

The good news is that Trump loyalists don’t represent a majority of the electorate — which is why Trump has lost the popular vote in both his presidential runs and did not top 47 percent in either.

So, as long as the anti-Trump vote is unified behind Biden, Trump cannot win, as Biden demonstrated in 2020.

But if a third-party candidate takes even a small part of the anti-Trump vote away from Biden, Trump is likely to be returned to the White House.

Consider the five states most likely to decide the 2024 election in the Electoral College — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. In 2016, Trump narrowly won each of them, giving him the presidency. In 2020, these five states narrowly tipped in the other direction, giving Biden the presidency.

Biden’s razor-thin margins in these five states in 2020 came from a massive anti-Trump vote.

In all of these states, at least 1 in 3 Biden voters said they voted mainly against Trump. In Wisconsin (where the Green Party has already secured a spot on the 2024 ballot), 38 percent of Biden voters said they voted mainly against Trump. In Arizona (where No Labels has already secured a spot on the 2024 ballot), 45 percent of Biden voters said they voted mainly against Trump.

Biden has no margin for error. Even a small drop-off from his 2020 anti-Trump vote would make him vulnerable.

Just 44,000 votes out of more than 10 million cast in Arizona, Georgia, and Wisconsin — less than half of 1 percent — were the difference between the Biden presidency and a tie in the Electoral College that would have thrown the election to the House of Representatives, and hence to Trump.

 

If candidates from No Labels, the Green Party, and the People’s Party peel off just 15 percent of the anti-Trump vote from Biden, and Trump’s base stays with him, Trump would win all five swing states comfortably and return to the Oval Office.

These third parties are already putting out rubbish about “voting your conscience” and “giving the people a real choice.” It’s cynical propaganda designed to obscure the reality that any anti-Trump votes they pull away from Biden will only help ensure a Trump victory.

If No Labels were a legitimate third party rather than a Trump front, it would withdraw from all ballots for the 2024 election. If Cornel West and the Green Party had positive intentions, they would do the same. The rest of us must spread the word about the dangers of these third parties.

If Trump wins the GOP nomination for president, as seems highly likely despite (or because of) his coming trials, all Americans who believe in democracy must unite behind Joe Biden — to ensure that Trump, in the words of then-Rep. Liz Cheney, “never again gets anywhere near the Oval Office.”

Please spread the word. Now.

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Why Have So Many Americans Succumbed to Trumpism?

Chapter 6 of The Common Good

Robert Reich

Sep 8, 2023

 

 

 

Friends,

Today, in the sixth essay about the loss of America’s sense of common good, I want to summarize where we’ve come by focusing on one of the worst consequences of the loss: The emergence of Trumpism, and of the despair that has led so many Americans to give up on democracy.

Starting next week, in the seventh essay of this series, I’ll talk about what I believe we can and should do to resurrect the common good.

 

It is easy for many of us to condemn fellow Americans who have succumbed to the lies and thuggery of Donald Trump. It’s convenient for us to assume they’re ignorant, or racist, or gullible fools.

But what if their willingness to believe and support Trump is understandable, given what has happened to them? I’m not suggesting it’s justifiable, only that it may be explicable.

As we have seen, many of the key political and economic institutions of our society have abandoned their commitments to the common good — and along the way, abandoned the bottom half of the adult population, especially those without college degrees.

The consequence has been a catastrophe, especially for the bottom half. The erosion began 40 years ago. By 2016, when Trump was elected president, the typical American household had a net worth 14 percent lower than the typical household in 1984, while the richest one-tenth of 1 percent owned more wealth than the bottom 90 percent put together.

Income has become almost as unequal as wealth: Between 1972 and Trump’s election in 2016, the pay of the typical American worker dropped 2 percent, adjusted for inflation, although the American economy nearly doubled in size.

Most of the income gains have gone to the top. The 2016 Wall Street bonus pool was larger than the annual year-round earnings of all 3.3 million Americans working full-time at the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour.

Whereas 90 percent of American adults born in the early 1940s were earning more than their parents by the time they reached their prime earning years, this proportion steadily declined. Only half of adults born in the mid-1980s are now earning more than their parents by their prime earning years.

Average weekly nonsupervisory wages, a measure of blue-collar earnings, were higher in 1969 (adjusted for inflation) than they are now.

Most Americans without college degrees are working longer hours than they worked decades ago and taking fewer sick days or vacations, and they have less economic security.

Nearly one out of every five American workers is in a part-time job. Two-thirds are living paycheck to paycheck. Along with pay, employment benefits have been shriveling. The gap in life expectancy between the nation’s most affluent and everyone else is widening, as well.

Increasing numbers of working Americans have been succumbing to opioids. Death rates have been rising for Americans with no more than high school degrees, due to suicides, chronic liver cirrhosis, and poisonings, including drug overdoses.

Off the Top of My Head

Does China Have Some Version of Democracy and Capitalism?

by John Lawrence

The Chinese Communist Party in reality is just the Chinese Party. It is communist in name only. Kishore Mahbuboni in the book, Has China Won, says "...is America making a fundamental error of perception when it views the CCP as a Chinese Communist Party? This would imply that the soul of the CCP is embedded in its communist roots. Yet, in the eyes of many objective Asian observers, the CCP actually functions as the Chinese Civilization Party. Its soul is not rooted in the foreign ideology of Marxism-Leninism but in the Chinese civilization." China has had a capitalist economic system ever since the reforms of Deng Xiaoping in 1978. China has lifted 800 million people out of poverty in about 40 years mainly due to the component of its system that represents private enterprise. It also has state owned enterprises but they have not been mainly responsible for China's rapid growth in GDP.

Xi Jinping has been President of the people's Republic of China since 2013. He is not popularly elected by the general public. Instead, he is elected by the National People's Congress (NPC), constitutionally China's highest state body, which also has the power to remove the president and other state officers from office. Elections and removals are decided by majority vote. This is not dissimilar to how the head of parliamentary democracies, the Prime Minister is elected. The British head of government is not elected by a popular election of the people either. He is elected by members of Parliament similar to most other parliamentary democracies. The US also originally had a system in which the President and Senators were not elected by a popular election of the people. Passed by Congress on May 13, 1912, and ratified on April 8, 1913, the 17th Amendment modified Article I, Section 3, of the Constitution by allowing voters to cast direct votes for U.S. Senators and the President. Prior to its passage, the President and Senators were chosen by state legislatures. The Chinese government has been based on a meritocratic bureaucracy for thousands of years. The popular vote elects the first representative body who elects the next higher body until the National People's Congress elects the President.

The cleavage between communism and capitalism is basically an historic artifact. Capitalism won. Almost all nations of the world have capitalistic economic systems including China. None of them have systems that are identical to the US. They all have some versions of capitalism and democracy. Prior to 1912 the US had a system similar to China's in that the President was not popularly elected but was elected by a vote of the states' senates. Today in order to maintain international tensions, US politicians keep up the dichotomy between the US and China by insisting that China's leaders are not elected democratically and that China has a communist economic system. The truth is that China has a version of democracy and a version of capitalism just as the US does. Vested interests in the US are responsible for maintaining the fiction that Chinese is communist and autocratic. In fact US democracy is vulnerable to being overthrown by a demagogue like Donald Trump which almost happened on January 6, 2020. The US is still vulnerable as a near majority of Americans prefer Trump to Joe Biden, a man who has passed landmark legislation like only a very few American Presidents have accomplished.

US democracy is also vulnerable in the sense that its first past the post voting system almost guarantees that third party candidates will be spoilers as happened in 2000 when Ralph Nader took votes away from Al Gore. Despite that Gore won the popular vote. If Nader had not been in the election, Gore would have overwhelmingly won the popular vote. However in the electoral college, which is an outdated feature of American democracy, it came down to who won the popular vote in Florida. The Supreme Court stopped the hand recount giving Bush the Presidency. There is still controversy over who would have won if that hadn't happened. In any case the Bush administration lied us into the disastrous Iraq war, something Gore probably would not have done. Also Bush was a fossil fuel guy while Gore was knowledgeable about global warming and would have pursued that agenda . History might have turned out differently, and more importantly the future history of planet Earth might turn out differently if Gore had won.

Chinese philosophy is based on Confucianism which emphasizes duty to family while the US is based on individualistic ethics emphasizing individual freedom. Keyu Jin writes in The New China Playbook, "According to the World Values Survey, which explores people's beliefs and values in more than 100 countries, 93% of Chinese participants value security over freedom, as compared to only 28 % of Americans. Such differences can be fully understood only by taking culture and history into account. In China, an interventionist state is rooted in paternalism, a hallmark of government in China since Confucian times, more than 2500 years ago;..." Although China's private enterprise capitalism has resulted in the fact that 800 million people have been pulled out of poverty in 40 years, GDP growth is not the sine qua non of Chinese capitalism. Under Xi China is turning a corner and reining in certain aspects of unbridled growth in order to mitigate certain unsalutary aspects of unfettered enterprise while emphasizing producing economic benefits for the 13% of the Chinese population still in poverty. So China is much more apt to put its finger on the economic scale while the US has more of a hands off policy on private enterprise. The downside of this is the unregulated growth of toxic social media and potentially artificial intelligence in the US. The US could mitigate the spoiler effect of third party candidates for President by adopting a different voting system. The current first past the post voting system practically guarantees that there will be a 2 party system with third parties acting as spoilers, something which could result in a second Trump Presidency despite 91 criminal indictments. Replacing first past the post with a voting system such as approval voting would eliminate the spoiler effects of third parties. It could be implemented simply by a vote of Congress since it would not violate any aspect of the Constitution. However, in the sclerotic American Congress it is unlikely that there will be any major changes in the US Constitution which is well past its "use by" date.

From Nixon to Trump: The Decline of the Common Good in American Politics

Chapter 5 of The Common Good

Robert Reich

Aug 25, 2023

 

 

 

Friends,

America’s failure to hold Richard Nixon accountable for his attacks on democracy when he was president undermined the common good and paved the way for Donald Trump to mount even worse attacks.

The scandal that came to be known as “Watergate” and led to Nixon’s resignation from the presidency was a shock to the American political system. Afterward (analogous to putting locks on the doors after a town’s first robbery), Congress enacted many reforms, but all were eventually watered down or found by the Supreme Court to be unconstitutional.

The Watergate scandal began the modern era of “whatever-it-takes-to-win” politics — blatant disregard of any and all norms and laws that interfered with gaining or keeping power. Trump is the logical and inevitable consequence.

In 1974, in his last remarks about Watergate as a senator, 77-year-old Sam Ervin —who as chairman of the Senate Watergate Committee became widely revered for his fairness and deep respect for the Constitution — explained that President Nixon and his aides had “a lust for political power” that “blinded them to ethical considerations and legal requirements; to Aristotle’s aphorism that the good of man must be the end of politics.”

What was particularly chilling about Nixon’s behavior was his disdain for the common good and total obsession with himself.

On the tapes of his White House meetings, Nixon can be heard to talk incessantly about himself — his needs, his place in history, and his animosities — but he never once mentions the nation’s needs. For Richard M. Nixon, there was no common good. Only Richard Nixon.

 

The details of what occurred still shock.

In 1970, Nixon authorized break-ins or “black bag jobs” of people considered domestic security threats. An early goal was to destroy the reputation of Daniel Ellsberg, who had leaked to the news media the Pentagon Papers, showing that the Johnson administration had lied to the American people about the Vietnam War.

Nixon’s burglars broke into the office of Ellsberg’s psychiatrist, seeking information that might smear Ellsberg and undermine his credibility in the antiwar movement. “You can’t drop it, Bob,” Nixon told his assistant H. R. Haldeman in June 1971, referring to Ellsberg. “You can’t let the Jew steal that stuff and get away with it. You understand?”

In early 1972, Nixon launched a plan for spying on and sabotaging Democrats in the upcoming presidential campaign, including wiretaps and burglaries.

His henchmen paid the chauffeur of Senator Ed Muskie, whom Nixon considered his most likely Democratic opponent, to photograph Muskie’s internal memos and strategy documents.

They paid others to dig up dirt on the sex life of Senator Ted Kennedy, a potential opponent in 1976. “I’d really like to get Kennedy taped,” Nixon told Haldeman. They inserted a retired Secret Service agent into the team protecting Kennedy who, Haldeman assured Nixon, would “do anything that I tell him.” Nixon replied, “We just might get lucky and catch this son of a bitch and ruin him for ’76,” adding, “That’s going to be fun.”

Nixon ordered another assistant, John Ehrlichman, to direct the Internal Revenue Service to investigate the tax returns of all likely Democratic presidential candidates, including Kennedy. “Are we going after their tax returns?” Nixon asked. “You know what I mean? There’s a lot of gold in them thar hills.”

Off the Top of My Head

How Trump and All His Co-defendants Will Win

by John Lawrence

In a nutshell: get one Trump voter on the juries. You need all 12 jurors to agree that someone is guilty. You need only one Trump voter on the jury to acquit. Who wins? The lawyers who will make millions. The media who will be transfixed with this legal circus. It'll end up being much ado about nothing. If Trump happens to be found guilty and actually faces jail time, he will probably leave the country. Why should a billionaire or semi-billionaire, who has assets in other countries and probably money stashed away off shore, willingly go to some sleazy jail or even some country club jail when he could live well in some other country? Trump is not exactly a loyal American citizen who adheres to the rule of law and playing fair. He can declare from abroad that he is some sort of President in Absentia and his loyal followers will still probably send him money. He will say he is prepared to come back to America as soon as his followers take political power and he can come in riding on a white horse.

Trump and his lawyers like constitutional scholar John Eastman who set up the fake electors scheme will work the system, and, if they can't convince one juror of their innocence, they will get themselves pardoned by the next elected Republican President which could be in 2024. American voters are nothing if not fickle. They have one of the best Presidents in American history who, despite great odds, accomplished more than anyone since Lyndon Johnson. Biden's popularity is in the tank despite his accomplishments. Why is this? Maybe because of his age. Maybe because he's not "charismatic" enough. Trump voters seem to be impressed by his charisma first and foremost. I guess charisma and popularity, not competence, is what gets you elected President in this country. Even as he faces 91 criminal indictments, on the TV it's all Trump, all the time. Just like the movie Trump is everywhere all the time all over the place.

Trump and his lawyers had a scheme for replacing electors, but it was not all that far fetched. Until 1913 state legislatures had control over electors. Passed by Congress on May 13, 1912, and ratified on April 8, 1913, the 17th Amendment modified Article I, Section 3, of the Constitution by allowing voters to cast direct votes for U.S. senators. Prior to its passage, senators were chosen by state legislatures. So Eastman and others were just trying to argue that there was something unconstitutional about the 17th Amendment. The Supreme Court might have been convinced that he was right and the state legislatures should have the final say in which case Trump would have been elected, not Biden. Republicans have used the Supreme Court before to get George W Bush elected in 2000 despite the fact that, when all the votes were counted, Al Gore really won the election. Bush convinced the Supreme Court to stop counting the votes. The result was the disastrous George W Bush administration in which he lied us into the Iraq war.

Republicans have been using dirty tricks for years to get themselves elected including gerrymandering and doctoring voter rolls to eliminate black voters. Black politicians and activists say that Republican lawmakers have used racial gerrymandering and voter suppression to secure those majorities and are using their political might to further consolidate power among mostly White Republicans. Republicans have been busy removing black voters from registration lists. According to Mother Jones: Fifty-five percent of the registration notices were sent to municipalities where Hillary Clinton had defeated Donald Trump, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, and nine of the 10 areas with the highest concentration of voters on the purge list were big cities and college towns that had voted for Clinton. Milwaukee and Madison, the state’s two Democratic strongholds, accounted for 14 percent of the state’s registered voters but 23 percent of the names on the removal list. Voters in predominantly Black neighborhoods or areas with large student populations were nearly twice as likely to be flagged for removal, The Guardian found.

Trump and his lawyers just took dirty tricks to a whole new level. Now they will win in court just by the process of jury selection. It only takes one to find any of the myriad of defendants not guilty.

Off the Top of My Head

Contrasting the Chinese, EU and American Economic Systems

by John Lawrence

Since 2001, China has pursued a “going-out” investment policy. At first, the PRC (People's Republic of China) mainly encouraged SOEs (state owned enterprises) to invest overseas but in recent years, China's overseas investments have diversified with both state and private enterprises investing in nearly all industries and economic sectors. After Deng Xiaoping came to power in the late 1970s, China opened up its economic policy with the result that approximately 800 million people were lifted out of poverty in about 40 years. This turned China into a capitalistic nation ruled by the Chinese Communist party although the word "communist" is largely an anachronism at this point. China developed a unique economic system comprised of state owned enterprises and private enterprise. It has been the private aspects of China's system that have mainly driven the huge increases in GDP to the point where China is likely to take over the US as the world's largest economy in terms of GDP in a few years.

There are 4 components of GDP: consumption, investment, government spending and profit from exports. Some of the reasons for China's becoming an economic powerhouse are that consumption is only 38% of GDP whereas US consumption is nearly 70% of GDP. While Americans consume, China produces, exports and invests. I would characterize the US as having a Taylor Swift economy, an economy based on consumption of entertainment and other disposable items with no lasting value. It has been reported that Taylor Swift and the Barbie movie have been at least somewhat responsible for keeping the American economy afloat. When you add in social media and professional athletics, much of American consumption is immediately disposed of as soon as the event is over. In the EU consumption is about 52% of GDP so somewhat larger than China's but much less than the US.

Chinese investment is 43% of GDP while The US' is about 16%. EU investment is about 25% of GDP so midway between the US and China. At 21.4% EU government spending is larger than either the US (17.6%) or China (16%). Like the American government the Chinese government doesn't spend a lot of money on welfare. Chinese families are basically savers and provide a lot of the same services to their own intergenerational extended families which are provided by EU governments. The American ethos is largely individualistic and so many family members who can't provide for themselves fall through the cracks. This is one reason for the homeless crisis in the US.

The Chinese economy is bolstered by the fact that it is a net exporter (2.5% of GDP) while the US (-2.7%) and the EU (-2.7%) are net importers which subtracts from their GDPs. China also exports capital and manpower in the form of the Belt and Road Initiative. Announced in 2013, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) aims to strengthen China’s connectivity with the world. It combines new and old projects, covers an expansive geographic scope, and includes efforts to strengthen hard infrastructure, soft infrastructure, and cultural ties. As of October 2019, the plan touches 138 countries with a combined Gross Domestic Product of $29 trillion and some 4.6 billion people. Supporting a diverse array of initiatives that enhance connectivity throughout Eurasia and beyond could serve to strengthen China’s economic and security interests while bolstering overseas development. 

The Chinese political system, nominally communist, has the same elements of democracy that the early US political system had which is that locally elected bodies select the next higher political body with 3 successive iterations so that the National Assembly is chosen by the provincial assemblies at the next lower level. The original American Constitution had a similar feature in that the Senate was not chosen directly by the people but by state legislatures. State legislatures continued to elect senators until adoption of the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution in 1913 which provided for popular election of senators. The Chinese system tends to meritocraticy with the best and brightest ascending to the top levels whereas the more democratic American system has within it the possibility of electing complete idiots like Donald Trump whose ascendancy served to prove how vulnerable the two party system really is. By contrast the Chinese emphasize harmony and stability which are attributes of their main philosophical inheritance: Confucianism.

Off the Top of My Head

American Democracy Teetering on the Brink

by John Lawrence

So what are the possible outcomes? Let's assume Trump is the Republican nominee. Option 1: Trump is convicted and goes to jail before the 2024 election. In this scenario, Trump will probably lose the election for President. Independents will be aghast. Trump's base will not be able to organize sufficiently to carry out another assault on the seat of American democracy. There will be sporadic outbursts. In jail Trump will not have the media exposure he has outside of jail. Option 2: Trump is indicted multiple times but not convicted before the 2024 election. Trump probably still loses the national election, but is in a position as a free man to organize another insurrection, this time on a much larger level than the one on January 6, 2021. This could amount to civil war. Option 3: Trump loses the election and subsequently goes to jail. This could also result in a dangerous situation because Trump still has access to an outsize megaphone and continue to rile up his base before he goes to jail and cause trouble leading again to a possible civil war.

As long as Trump is a free man, he can continue to foment a revolution. He can continue to advocate for violence towards his perceived enemies, even those that are a legitimate part of the judicial and legal system. He is already attacking Jack Smith, the special counsel, who is prosecuting him on multiple counts regarding January 6 and also the document handling fiasco. Trump continues to insist that the American legal system is not legitimate. He continues to undermine the legitimacy of the rule of law. His followers essentially consist of a cult who want Trump exonerated irrespective of his purported criminality. As long as Trump is free, he will continue to whip up his followers and lead them to the brink of civil war. Who knows if in addition to Trump's calls for revolution, there is also a parallel movement going on to organize for a response to Trump's being convicted and put in jail or if Trump loses the election regardless of whether he has been convicted or not. Trump's followers are bound and determined to put Trump back in the White House by any means necessary. They will do whatever Trump eggs them on to do.

The United States' continued existence as a democracy cannot be taken for granted at this point. The Republican controlled House can throw the US into chaos if they decide not to authorize the budget. That in and of itself could shut the country down. There is a good chance that they will not authorize the continuance of government spending. There are many other ways that they could partner with Trump to bring the country down. Are some elements of the military also in league with Trump? Who knows. It seems that they were on January 6 when they wouldn't send troops to protect the Capitol on a timely basis. Obviously, some people in the military establishment sympathize with Trump. The influence of Fox News and other conservative media continues to amplify Trump's messages. The First Amendment guarantee of free speech enhances Trump's ability to foment a possible civil war. Trump's base who have grievances going back to loss of the Civil War combined with Trump's perceived grievances reinforce each other. An aggrieved leader and his aggrieved followers represent a volatile mixture

Trump almost succeeded in overturning the American government on January 6. Only Mike Pence stood in his way. Notably, firearms were not a part of the insurrectionists' arsenal as they invaded the Capitol. Marjorie Taylor Greene has said that next time they would bring their fire arms. Could another mob do what they did on January 6, and also be successful at it? Or could they be successful at the State level? These are tenuous times during which a number of scenarios involving Trump trying to take over the American government could play out. His base will never accept the outcomes of any indictments or even convictions. How will they react when he is sentenced to jail for the rest of his life? Or will the prosecutors chicken out when it comes to conviction and putting Trump in jail. If Trump is successful in fomenting a civil war, an unlimited right of Free Speech will be largely to blame. Can Trump be sentenced to shutting his mouth?

Off the Top of My Head

Toxic Masculinity

by John Lawrence

Traditional masculine traits are dominance, aggression, emotional repression, violence. These traits have been historically mostly expressed in terms of the military. In the First World War, many of the participants were more than eager to cover themselves in glory by proving their manhood in combat. Instead many of them ended up dying miserable deaths in muddy trenches or hung from barbed wire. The persistence of war in the human experience can be laid squarely at the feet of men and their interpretation of what is manly in my opinion. In fact peace or even world peace is seen as a feminine idea. Most traditional men would not consider peace in the form of world wide understanding and compassion even possible because it would be based on feminine values. The only peace even possible in the traditional male mind is "peace through strength." Traditional male values prevent even an acknowledgment of what peace would really consist of because it would consist of emotional values that are traditionally feminine. The predominant attitude is that joining the military will "make a man out of you." A real man is only supposed to express a limited and actually stunted set of emotions and certainly is not supposed to express any vulnerabilities. Physical force or the threat of force is acceptable in a man's world. Understanding, cooperation and diplomacy are not.

Traditional male activities are beer drinking (a man can hold his liquor), fast car racing or pickup driving (showing dominance by means of a powerful machine), participation in or spectating at competitive sports, participation in or admiration of the military. Dominance, competitiveness, the use or threat of violence, pugnaciousness, toughness, looking down on men who don't conform to this stereotype - these are all traditional male traits. None of these traits are physically or mentally healthy. For instance, holding your liquor can lead to cirrhosis of the liver. Emotional repressiveness can lead to an inability to relate to women even though some women are attracted to the traditional male type. In fact it can be argued that Trump's popularity is a result of his expression of traditional male values. In an article in FiveThirtyEight entitled With His Version of Masculinity, we find this:

But the quest to seem masculine is particularly complicated in this year’s GOP primary because Trump has been so successful at projecting a macho image that Republican voters have responded to. This masculine identity isn’t about demonstrations of physical prowess — nobody talks about how far Trump can run or whether he can bench-press a certain weight. His version of manliness is fueled by other kinds of behavior — including his belittling of other candidates, aggression toward women, “tell it like it is and don’t apologize” affect — that are associated with traditional ideas about how a man should behave. The other GOP candidates largely aren’t trying to imitate those aspects of Trump’s macho identity — but experts told us that without Trump’s signature belligerence, his version of masculinity might not resonate as much. And that means his rivals may have an especially difficult time convincing the GOP primary electorate that they’re as strong a leader as Trump.

“In this view of masculinity, men are supposed to be dominant, powerful, aggressive,” said Theresa Vescio, a professor of psychology at Penn State University who studies masculinity. “And the more that people — both men and women — think that good men should be high in power, status, dominance and toughness, the more they say that’s what a man is, the more they support Trump.”

It might seem strange to some that a man who is not particularly physically fit or athletic, never served in the military and eats junk food is an exemplary manifestation of manhood. It seems ridiculous that Trump's penchant for belittling his opponents is seen by some as "manly." That his getting away with stiffing contractors, creditors and not paying taxes are manly traits. But somehow Trump's unwillingness to apologize about anything or ever admit he did anything wrong is seen by some Republicans as the counter to "liberal values" like having compassion and respect for people who disagree with you. Instead Trump calls his detractors and competitors names, assails them as weaklings and asserts his macho masculinity while he hides behind a bevy of lawyers and uses his money to shield himself from any negative consequences. His seeming ability to get away with stuff is seen as quintessentially masculine. The article continues:

These are the voters who are especially likely to find Trump’s version of masculinity appealing. Trump is particularly effective at drawing on his supporters’ fears about threats to traditional masculinity, while simultaneously building himself up as a paragon of that version of manliness, according to the experts we spoke with. His image as president was aggressively militant, threatening other world leaders and avoiding compromise. And his refusal to apologize for a well-documented track record of sexual harassment and assault makes him seem authentically masculine and powerful to some voters, according to Dan Cassino, a political scientist at Fairleigh Dickinson University who studies male gender identity. “It’s as much about tearing others down as it is about building others up,” Cassino says. “The insults, the misogynistic behavior — these are very negative masculine traits but he’s willing to assert them in a way others aren’t, and that means nobody thinks he’s lying about who he is.”

By projecting an image of himself as a powerful, strong, dominant man who’s willing to shrug away modern conventions around how men and women should behave, Trump has reached people who support traditional gender hierarchies. “There are a lot of conservatives — men but some women too — in this country who increasingly feel like they’re on the outside looking in, while liberals run things,” said Paul Elliott Johnson, a professor of communication at the University of Pittsburgh who studies gender and politics. “Trump invites those people to feel victimized and then says, ‘I will fix the problem.’”

As detrimental to society in general as these toxic traditional masculine values are, they will even probably contribute to the annihilation of the human race altogether either through war or the ignoring of climate change. There is not even any talk of world peace any more. It's not even on anyone's radar. The militarization of the American psyche is complete. The Peace Corps is never even mentioned in the media. Most people would not even know that it exists. The Peace Corps represents the feminine values of help and caring for those less fortunate. The traditional male simply looks upon them as losers in the game of life, probably because of their inferiority to white males. As traditional white males, they believe that they have simply outcompeted those who come from as Trump has termed them, "shithole countries."  Let people with feminine values agonize over them and their claims that rich white men should help them out with their situations due to climate change. Macho men would scoff at their suggestions that the rich nations should bear the cost of ameliorating the effects of global warming or as U.N. chief António Guterres declared, "global boiling." As Trump and other macho men might say, "suck it up." There will probably never be world peace until women run the world. And where would that leave the traditional man and his toxic values? Healthy manhood, in my humble opinion, should be nothing more nor less than loving, supporting and cherishing the girls and women in our lives whether they be girlfriends, lovers, wives, daughters, mothers or grandmothers. All the rest of the positive values a man can manifest are simply personhood values which can be exemplified by both sexes.

Competence isn’t enough. Biden must also confront America’s economic bullies.

“Bidenomics” and “competence versus craziness” won't hack it.

Robert Reich

Jul 5, 2023

 

Friends,

It seems likely that the two major contenders for president next year will be Joe Biden and Donald Trump.

What will be their messages?

Biden has framed that choice as competence or craziness. His new “Bidenomics” blueprint makes clear that America has done well under his quietly competent leadership — featuring significant public investment, taming of inflation, and rebirth of manufacturing.

Trump has framed the choice as strength or weakness.

 

I’d rather have someone in the White House who’s competent (even if weak) than someone who’s crazy (even if strong).

But I fear voters may choose strength over competence.

Strength is one of the central narratives of America. In the mythic telling, America was borne from grit, guts, and gumption.

You probably learned it in school: We fought for our independence. We “tamed” the frontier. We won the Revolution. We prevailed in World Wars I and II.

The story conveniently leaves out slavery and genocide, as well as the more recent tragedies of Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Latin America. But it’s deeply engrained in the American mind — far more so than is competence.  

Besides his Big Lie, Trump’s most dangerous con has been that America needs a strongman, and he fits the bill.

For Trump, every issue boils down to strength or weakness. Trump admires strongmen. He seeks dominance. He despises vulnerability.

Although he has never mentioned “social Darwinism” (I doubt he even knows the term), it’s the snake oil Trump sells — survival of the fittest, success to the mightiest, victory to the strongest. Life is a competitive struggle. America will be great only if we reward the strong and punish the weak.

Trump’s base — along with millions of other working Americans — feel bullied by a system that has marginalized and diminished them.

Trump blames liberal Democrats, Marxists, socialists, “coastal elites,” the Deep State, the FBI, the Justice Department, the IRS, and the Mainstream Media, along with non-whites and immigrants.

This angry base includes men who feel they’ve lost ground to women’s growing economic and political power.

Trump’s base wants a strongman who will bully these bullies.

 

Trump acts the part of a heroic brawler who’s loathed by the establishment but loved by the masses. His vindictiveness toward cultural elites makes his followers feel vindicated. “I am your voice,” he said on July 21, 2016. Many believed him then and still do.

It’s all a show, of course. Trump is a billionaire grifter who as president gave away trillions in tax cuts to billionaires and continues to rake in money from his time in office. But the more indignant Trump makes the cultural establishment, the happier his base, because their indignation makes them feel vindicated.

Finally, you can bet that Trump and the Republicans will magnify every sign of Biden’s frailty — his occasional difficulties pronouncing words, his slow gait, his moments of confusion. And they will do whatever they can to project Trump’s vitality.

So, I fear “competence or craziness” won’t do it.

The best way for Biden and the Democrats to counteract Trump’s “strength or weakness” is by taking aim at the real bullies of America — the C-suite oligarchs, Wall Street plutocrats, billionaire monopolists who have been riding roughshod over the vast majority of Americans.

End their big-monied corruption of our democracy. Stop their monopolizing of the economy. Prevent them from using their economic power to raise prices. Call a halt to their firing workers without notice, shipping jobs abroad, and busting unions.

“Bidenomics” could create hundreds of thousands of good manufacturing jobs. That’s good, but not sufficient.

The most powerful force in American politics today is anti-establishment fury at a rigged economic system.

To counter Trump’s fake battle with cultural elites whom he accuses of undermining America’s moral core, Biden should mount a real battle against economic elites who have shafted America’s middle and working classes.

What do you think?

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Off the Top of My Head

Former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) Says Americans Need To Stop “Electing Idiots.”

by John Lawrence

Did the Founders design a Constitution that was idiot proof? Not according to Liz Cheney. Is this a flaw that is inherent to democracy? Not necessarily although it seems to be a flaw in the American system of democracy. There are other forms of democracy that may be more idiot proof. For instance, a democracy in which there are background requirements for political representatives such as education and experience. It is important to have a President who is educated and experienced in areas related to government. The Senate and House of Representatives also should have education and background requirements. Any corporation requires education and experience requirements for jobs. Why should the government be any different? The Hill reported:

Former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) suggested Monday that the problem with American politics is that “we’re electing idiots.”

“Look, I think that the country right now faces hugely challenging and fundamentally important issues,” Cheney said at an event with the cultural and community center, 92nd Street Y, New York. “What we’ve done in our politics is create a situation where we’re electing idiots.”

Cheney, who is a staunch opponent of former President Trump, offered the reflection in response to a question about whether she would run for president if polling showed that it would hurt Trump’s third White House run.

“I don’t look at it through the lens of, you know, is this what I should do or what I shouldn’t do,” the former congresswoman said. “I look at it through the lens of, how do we elect serious people? And I think electing serious people can’t be partisan.”

Cheney, who is a staunch opponent of former President Trump, offered the reflection in response to a question about whether she would run for president if polling showed that it would hurt Trump’s third White House run.

“I don’t look at it through the lens of, you know, is this what I should do or what I shouldn’t do,” the former congresswoman said. “I look at it through the lens of, how do we elect serious people? And I think electing serious people can’t be partisan.”

“I really believe, and I’ve never believed something as strongly as I know this, that the single most important thing for the country is that Donald Trump can’t be anywhere near the Oval Office again,” she said.

The question is how do you accomplish "not electing idiots" within the constraints of the American system? Or should the American system be redesigned to accomplish this goal? Perhaps the first item should be to educate the populace in such a way that the voting pubic contains as few idiots as possible. If the electorate is a bunch of idiots, then they will elect someone who looks like them - namely, an idiot. The second thing is that perhaps people running for office should be required to take a test, the results of which would show their knowledge of the position they aspire to whether it's the Presidency, the House or the Senate. Americans are subjected to testing all through their educational experience. Corporations that hire American workers are very interested in their test scores. They want to know whether or not the person they are hiring is an idiot. Why doesn't this apply to politicians as well? Otherwise, running for election comes down to a popularity contest and very often a blood sport. Is this the kind of person who should be running our government?

Off the Top of My Head

Why Didn't Democrats Raise the Debt Ceiling When They Controlled Both Houses of Congress?

by John Lawrence

What is clear is that Democrats can only get new legislation passed when they control all three branches of government. This legislation usually increases spending on social programs. Likewise, Republicans can only get their legislation composed - usually of tax cuts - when they control all three branches of government. Both cases usually require the government to deficit spend, the former because of increased government spending, the latter because of decreased government revenues from taxes. So whichever party controls Congress and the Presidency and passes a budget requiring increassed deficit spending should also at the same time raise the debt limit. Make sense? So now we're in this dystopian dilemma that, after Democrats passed Biden's budget requiring a huge amount of government spending, Republicans, who now control the House, effectively want to repeal Biden's budget or else they won't agree to raise the debt ceiling. What a conundrum! These problems would never come up if the party that deficit spent also raised the debt ceiling to accommodate the deficit spending.

Congress has raised the debt ceiling twice under Biden, by about $3 trillion. Republicans voted three times to raise the debt ceiling under President Donald Trump, who added nearly $8 trillion to the national debt. "Republicans in Congress raised the debt three times when Donald Trump was president and each time with Democrat support, but now they won’t raise it, even though they're responsible for more than $8 trillion in bills incurred in four years under the previous administration," Biden said. The 115th Congress (2017–2019) featured unified Republican control of the government with GOP majorities in the House and Senate, and Republican President Donald J. Trump in the White House. So Republicans had no problem with raising the debt ceiling during the Trump administration which added $7 trillion to the national debt. Please note that Democrats could have filibustered the debt ceiling increases during the Trump administration because Republicans did not have a filibuster proof Senate, but they didn't

Raising the debt limit is not about new spending; it is about paying for previous choices policymakers legislated. However, if the previous choice were made by a government controlled by the Democratic party in a two party system, there is every reason to get those choices reversed when the Republican party comes into power and vice versa although Democrats have never tried to bring the country to the brink of default, a game of chicken which Republicans have been all to eager to engage in. They were successful in doing this when Obama was President. Having seen that chaos and mess as vice Preesident, Biden is not willing to engage in negotiations this time around hoping that more sensible heads will prevail. It didn't used to be this way. Sometimes called the Gephardt Rule in honor of Representative Dick Gephardt who introduced its first version, the rule used to provide that when the House agrees to a budget resolution, the Clerk shall prepare a joint resolution suspending the debt limit for the fiscal year covered by the budget resolution. In other words the debt ceiling was automatically effectively raised to accommodate the budget. This all changed when Newt Gingrich became Speaker of the House. When Newt Gingrich took over the House in 1995, he nullified the ingenious “Gephardt rule” that deemed the debt limit to be increased whenever a budget passed. This eventually led to the 1995 and 1996 government shutdowns, when Republicans refused to increase the limit because the president was a Democrat. In 2011, a showdown over the debt ceiling during Barack Obama’s presidency led to the Budget Control Act and ten subsequent years of austerity budgets.

So the simple answer to the question posed by the title of this piece is that, although Democrats controlled both Houses of Congress during the first two years of the Biden administration, they did not have a filibuster proof majority in the Senate. Therefore, they could get a budget passed under the budget reconciliation rule which prevents a filibuster, but they could not raise the debt ceiling because that is subject to the filibuster. Oh what tangled webs these politicians weave! Nothing makes clearer the need to end the filibuster than another round of hostage-taking of the full faith and credit of the U.S. government. Add this to the mounting problems of American democracy. Congress has created an arcane jumble of chaotic rules which threatens government of the people, for the people, and by the people. Go figure.

Off the Top of My Head

The Failure to Pacify Korea

by John Lawrence

Compare the two situations. Vietnam is a unified country, and after a horrific war, is on good terms with the US. Korea is a divided country with the north being still at war with the United States. A peace treaty was never signed after the Korean war and the country was never pacified and unified with the result that North Korea is a major threat to the western world. To boot, there is an axis forming with China, Russia, Iran and North Korea. It didn't have to be this way. One hint is that former President Trump, albeit in a publicity stunt, momentarily eased tensions by becoming friendly with Kim Jong Un. If this had been a sincere gesture and had been followed up on, North Korea could have been unified with the south and the situation there normalized much as it has been in Vietnam. CNN reported on October 24, 2019:

"Seoul, South Korea CNN  — 

"Kim Jong Un has praised his “special” relationship with US President Donald Trump, with one of North Korea’s most respected diplomats telling state media the two leaders maintain “trust in each other.”

"Kim Kye Gwan, a former nuclear negotiator who now serves as an adviser to the North Korean leader, said Kim Jong Un and Trump enjoy “close relations” – a statement that appeared to pin the future of diplomatic talks between Washington and Pyongyang on the two leaders’ unique connection.

“I sincerely hope that a motive force to overcome all the obstacles between the DPRK and the US and to advance the bilateral relations in the better direction will be provided on the basis of the close relationship,” the longtime diplomat said in a statement published in the country’s state-run news agency KCNA, using the acronym for North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea."

Then on June 12, 2020 NBC news reported:

"Never again will we provide the U.S. chief executive with another package to be used for achievements without receiving any returns," North Korea's Foreign Minister Ri Son Gwon said on state-run KCNA. Nothing is more hypocritical than an empty promise."

There was the possibility of movement toward normalization and peace in Korea, and this wasn't the first time. But does the US even know or care about achieving peace in Korea and officially ending the Korean war? I don't think so. But the Trump publicity stunt at least demonstrates that, in order to achieve peace, an effort must be made to achieve friendship between leaders of the concerned countries. In contrast current American leaders have gone out of their way to demonize and disrespect certain national leaders which makes it even less likely that peace will ever be achieved. Friendship, respect and diplomacy are the means by which to attain peace in the world. Otherwise, military standoffs and confrontation are likely to ensue, and they have. The US invests immense amounts of money in its military while investing paltry insignificant amounts in peace building efforts. The result is an alignment of western nations confronting an alignment of mostly everyone else.

Responsible Statecraft reported on February 6, 2023:

"A large majority of Americans support talks aimed at reducing tensions with North Korea and China, according to a survey released Friday by The Harris Poll. The results are at odds with the state of opinion in Washington, where policy elites continue to one-up each other over how to respond to an incident in which an apparent Chinese surveillance balloon flew over the U.S. in recent days.

"Two-thirds of respondents agreed that the U.S. should “engage in dialogue as much as possible to reduce tensions” with China, while 20 percent said Washington should “not restart official dialogue and instead spend more money on military build-up.” Support for talks focused on deescalation went up by five points since 2021, when Harris last asked the question.

"Meanwhile, 68 percent of Americans polled told Harris that President Joe Biden should offer to hold direct talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un, and 58 percent said the United States should offer diplomatic or economic incentives “in exchange for steps toward denuclearization.” "

Wikipedia reported: "In 2017, a majority of the American public also had a positive view of Moon Jae-in, the South Korean President, who in 2018 supported a formal declaration to end the U.S.-North Korean war." So if leaders on both sides in Korea want the war ended and negotiations to proceed towards that end, why is the US not on board with that? Could it be that the US doesn't want to lose an "ally" in South Korea and also lose its military bases there? Does the US not want to lose influence in Asia by helping to create peace there?

Over the years there have been various attempts to bring about peace on the Korean peninsula:

"On May 24, 2015, International Women's Day for Disarmament, thirty women—including US feminist leader Gloria Steinem, two Nobel Peace laureates and retired U.S. Colonel Ann Wright—from 15 countries linked arms with 10,000 Korean women, stationing themselves on both sides of the DMZ to urge a formal end to the Korean War (1950-1953), the reunification of families divided during the war, and a peace building process with women in leadership positions to resolve decades of hostility.

"In the weeks leading up to crossing the DMZ, Steinem told the press, “It's hard to imagine any more physical symbol of the insanity of dividing human beings."

"On the day of the crossing, South Korea refused to give the women permission to walk through Panmunjom, a border town where the 1953 truce was signed, so the women had to eventually cross the border by bus. Nevertheless, Steinem labeled the crossing a success. "“We have accomplished what no one said can be done, which is to be a trip for peace, for reconciliation, for human rights and a trip to which both governments agreed.”

"U.S.–North Korea talks began in June 1993 but with lack of progress in developing and implementing an agreement, North Koreans unloaded the core of a major nuclear reactor, which could have provided enough raw material for several nuclear weapons. With tensions high, Kim Il Sung invited former U.S. President Jimmy Carter to act as an intermediary. Carter accepted the invitation, but could only act as a private citizen not a government representative. Carter managed to bring the two states to the negotiating table, with Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs Robert Gallucci representing the United States and North Korean Vice Foreign Minister Kang Sok-ju representing his country.

"The negotiators successfully reached the U.S.-North Korea Agreed Framework in October 1994:

• North Korea agreed to freeze its existing plutonium enrichment program, to be monitored by the IAEA;
• Both sides agreed to cooperate to replace North Korea's graphite-moderated reactors with light water reactor (LWR) power plants, to be financed and supplied by an international consortium (later identified as the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization or KEDO) by a target date of 2003;
• The United States and North Korea agreed to work together to store safely the spent fuel from the five-megawatt reactor and dispose of it in a safe manner that does not involve reprocessing in North Korea;
• The United States agreed to provide shipments of heavy fuel oil to provide energy in the meantime;
• The two sides agreed to move toward full normalization of political and economic relations;
• Both sides agreed to work together for peace and security on a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula; and
• Both sides agreed to work together to strengthen the international nuclear non-proliferation regime.

Soon after the agreement was signed, U.S. Congress control changed to the Republican Party, who did not support the agreement. Some Republican Senators were strongly against the agreement, regarding it as appeasement.

Looked at from an historical perspective, it's clear that, although attempts have been made to bring about peace by some well meaning Americans like Jimmy Carter, other Americans have thought it in the US' best interests to continue a state of war on the Korean peninsula. It has been a complete and catastrophic failure to create peace there. Sometimes risks have to be taken to create peace. You can't be 100% sure that the other side will adhere to an agreement. However, as they used to say, "Give peace a chance." You can go all out for peace while remaining vigilant and militarily strong at the same time.

What the media doesn’t understand about Trump’s third presidential campaign

He's indicted. What does this mean? What the media doesn’t understand about Trump’s third presidential campaign

He’s no longer running for president of the United States

Robert Reich

 

Mar 30, 2023

 

 

 

Donald J. Trump was indicted in Manhattan today for his role in paying hush money to a porn star. In coming days, prosecutors in the office of the Manhattan district will likely ask Trump to surrender and to face arraignment.

What’s the real significance of this? What will it mean?

Last Saturday, at the first rally of his presidential campaign, in Waco, Texas, Trump talked about the criminal cases being prepared against him as if they were being prepared against his supporters.

“They’re not coming after me, they’re coming after you,” he said, predicting that “you will be vindicated and proud.”

The wording was no accident. To Trump, there is no difference between himself and his supporters, and no difference between his supporters and the parts of the United States where they’re the majority. 

This is key. Trump views himself, his supporters (whom he calls “my people”), and their domains as one and the same. Anyone who opposes him is “them” — outside the universe of his identity, past the places that embrace him, beyond the borders of his pathological ego.

Trump’s fusion of himself with his supporters galvanizes those who project onto him the power and status they feel they’ve lost in America — people who are mostly white, rural, and without college degrees. 

But Trump is not engaging in this fusion as a means of being reelected president. In fact, even if it helps him win the Republican nomination, it will lose him the general election, because it will turn off all Republicans who are focused on real issues or who worry that he’s nuts, and it will cause independents to flee.

The dirty little secret of Trump’s third campaign for president — one that the media has so far ignored — is that he is not seeking to become president of the United States, at least not the United States as it is now organized. He is seeking to become president of a very different nation — overwhelmingly white, straight, Christian, and authoritarian.

The policies Trump promoted in his speech are designed to change America into that nation — featuring, for example, the “largest mass deportation in United States history,” along with efforts to reverse “declining fertility rates” (white-nationalist code for encouraging white couples to have more babies).

Trump will use today’s indictment to galvanize his supporters even further.

***

At his rally last Saturday, Trump claimed that the greatest threat to the United States was “not China or Russia” but the people in the “Department of ‘Injustice,’” and “high-level politicians that work in the U.S. government, like McConnell, Pelosi, Schumer, and Biden.”

When he was president, Trump expressed admiration for Putin and Xi. Presumably, the reason he admires them is that both have fused their personal identities with the identities of their countries (and along the way eliminated all opposition). The greatest threats to Trump’s attempt to accomplish the same in the United States are his domestic opponents, along with Republicans (like Mitch McConnell) who fail to give him full-throttled support.

Similarly, when he spoke last Saturday of “demonic forces” trying to demolish America, he was referring to demonic forces trying to demolish him — and, by implication, his supporters and their America.

For Trump, every major challenge facing America is a major challenge to Trump, and vice versa.

Last Saturday, he called the “weaponization of our justice system” the “central issue of our time.” During last year’s midterms, he tried to make his lies about fraud in his 2020 election defeat the most pressing issue facing the nation.

In his mind, the two are linked. He is now recasting the January 6 attack on the Capitol as an act of patriotism by those who view the 2020 election as illegitimate. The Waco rally even featured singing by men who were imprisoned for their part in the attack. A massive screen flashed images of the January 6 attack while Trump recited the Pledge of Allegiance.

***

He still has not accepted the result of the 2020 election, because it was the product of people who voted against him, and Trump never considered himself president of people who reject him. Following the same sociopathic logic, he will not accept the result of the 2024 election if he is not elected. His mind is incapable of accepting it. The fusion of himself, his followers, and America renders such an outcome impossible, just as the 2020 outcome was impossible.

Yet in fact he will not be elected — unless the U.S. economy is by then in a deep recession, or Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee, has a serious health problem.

Brace yourselves. We have been here before. It culminated on January 6, 2021. The angry, xenophobic, misogynistic, racist, antisemitic, conspiratorial forces Trump unleashed then are still very much with us. And they are now more entrenched in Congress and state legislatures than they were then. By November 2024, they will be ready for a second attempted coup.

Trump wants and expects a civil war over himself, a final clash between Americans who love him and Americans who loathe him — between his egomaniacal views of good and evil. A civil war is unlikely, but the next year and a half is likely to be fraught — another stress test of American democracy.

Last Saturday was only Trump’s first campaign rally. It will not go up from here.

Off the Top of My Head

How Liz Cheney Can Defeat Trump in the 2024 Election

by John Lawrence

Run for President as a third party candidate. She will siphon off enough Republican votes to insure Trump's loss. She has the name recognition and chutzpah to run for President. She's already raising money with her super PAC - The Great Task. There are enough disaffected Republicans that will vote for her, and, even though she would probably come in third in a Presidential race, she could guarantee that Trump or a Trump-like candidate would lose. Therefore, a Democrat will win. Cheney obviously has no affection at this point for the Republican Party, a party that oversaw her defeat in a landslide for her incumbent Congressional seat in Wyoming. She is more interested in a win for America and the principles of the Constitution, and, as an American patriot, she is committed to Trump's losing the 2024 Presidential election.

The US has a history of third party candidates handing wins to the party that they are least aligned with. In 1992, Ross Perot ran unsuccessfully as an independent candidate for President of the United States. Perot was a Texas industrialist who had never served as a public official, but he had experience as the head of several successful corporations and had been involved in public affairs for the previous three decades. Although Perot received no votes in the Electoral College, he won several counties, placed second in two states, and ended up far ahead of any other non major party candidate finishing in third place overall, receiving close to 18.97 percent of the popular vote, the most won by a third-party presidential candidate since Theodore Roosevelt in 1912. His presence in the race may have been enough to deny George H W Bush a second term.

Even more salient was the 2000 Presidential election. The 2000 presidential campaign of Ralph Nader, political activist, author, lecturer and attorney, began on February 21, 2000. He cited "a crisis of democracy" as motivation to run. He ran in the 2000 United States presidential election as the nominee of the Green Party. Nader siphoned off enough votes from Al Gore, who was the Democratic candidate, that George W Bush won the election despite the fact that Gore won the popular vote and despite the fact that, at Bush's request, the Supreme Court stopped the recount in Florida which would have nailed the state of Florida for Gore and the Presidential election itself.

Third party candidates can wreak havoc for the party that they're most closely aligned with. In 2000 Nader was more aligned with Democrats than Republicans. Yet he helped cinch the race for the Republican since he siphoned off Democratic votes. The same goes for Perot in the 1992 Presidential election in which he helped defeat the candidate of the party he was most closely aligned with - in this case the Republican party. Liz Cheney knows all this. She's no dummy. She knows she can guarantee a Trump defeat in 2024 if he should run by running for President herself as a third party candidate. No doubt Adam Kinzinger and other influential Republicans will join her in an effort to overthrow the Republican party which has become the party of Trump. Liz is well known enough that she does not suffer from any name recognition deficit. Polling shows that in the neighborhood of 30% of registered Republicans are disenchanted with Trump and Trumpism. They are appalled at the January 6 insurrection by devotees and sycophants of Trump. Liz Cheney can guarantee that the United States of America will be able to turn over a new leaf and start a new day with a new party dedicated to the principles of the rule of law and the American Constitution - sort of what the old Republican party used to be like. She is in a position to relegate Trump to the dustbin of history if he should somehow escape the grip of all the lawsuits he's now entangled with.

Off the Top of My Head

Bush V Gore Set Precedent for Trump v Biden

by John Lawrence

Remember when George W Bush took over the Presidency because the Supreme Court sided with him in his lawsuit to get the vote counting stopped? If it had continued Gore would have won the Presidency in 2000. If Gore had become the rightful President, there probably would not have been the disastrous and illegal Iraq wars. As is evident now Saudi Arabia was more to blame for 9/11 than Iraq or Afghanistan, but Bush wanted to be a war time President. The US government, during the George W Bush administration, kept documents secret that would have implicated Saudi Arabia as the sponsor of the 9/11 attack that killed 3000 Americans. Families of the 9/11 victims have had to retrieve documents from the British government that implicate Saudi Arabia whom they now blame for 9/11 and are suing for compensation.

In 2000 conservative justices on the Supreme Court voted to stop the counting of votes in Florida overruling the Florida Supreme Court. Wikipedia reported:

"Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98 (2000), was a decision of the United States Supreme Court on December 12, 2000, that settled a recount dispute in Florida's 2000 presidential election between George W. Bush and Al Gore. On December 8, the Florida Supreme Court had ordered a statewide recount of all undervotes, over 61,000 ballots that the vote tabulation machines had missed. The Bush campaign immediately asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay the decision and halt the recount. Justice Antonin Scalia, convinced that all the manual recounts being performed in Florida's counties were illegitimate, urged his colleagues to grant the stay immediately. On December 9, the five conservative justices on the Court granted the stay for Bush, with Scalia citing "irreparable harm" that could befall Bush, as the recounts would cast "a needless and unjustified cloud" over Bush's legitimacy. In dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens wrote that "counting every legally cast vote cannot constitute irreparable harm.""

Media organizations later analyzed the ballots and found that, under specified criteria, the originally pursued recount of undervotes of several large counties would have confirmed a Bush victory, whereas a statewide recount would have revealed a Gore victory. So Gore actually won the 2000 election. There would have been no illegal invasion of Iraq, and the US would have been well on the road to combating climate change because that was Gore's primary issue. How history might have been changed, if only ... So Trump probably figured, among his other plans to overturn the Biden victory in 2020, that the Supreme Court would probably be on his side in overturning the election since he had appointed 3 conservative justices to the Supreme Court, and the Court had essentially overturned the 2000 election in favor of George W Bush. However, Trump never got to the point of approaching the Supreme Court as Bush had done because Pence went ahead after the insurrection and presided over the vote count which assured that Biden had won the election. If the insurrectionists had sufficiently interrupted the proceedings on January 6, Trump's lawyers might then have petitioned the Supreme Court to rule in favor of Trump especially since the Court was overwhelmingly conservative, three of the Justices having been appointed by Trump himself. We'll never know, but what is clear is that Trump attempted a coup on January 6. It just didn't come off quite as he had planned.

Off the Top of My Head

If Huge Numbers of People Believe Something, Does It Make It True?

by John Lawrence

Huge numbers of people believe Trump won the election. By all objective measures, it's a false belief. Huge numbers also believe some particular religious doctrine. Does that make it true? When it comes to religion though, there are no objective measures. Did God actually give Moses two stone tablets containing the Ten Commandments at the top of Mount Sinai or was it Mount Horeb as it says elsewhere in the Bible. Or was it Mount Serbal or Mount Catherine where Christians built a monastery in the belief that one of these mountains is where Moses received the stone tablets. Biblical scholars cannot even agree exactly which mountain corresponds to Mount Sinai. Or, is it possible that Moses had the stone masonry skills to have carved the stone tablets himself and then just told the story that he had received them from God? After all if people believed the tablets were created just by Moses and not by God, they would have given the Ten Commandments a lot less consideration as something they should be concerned about.

The January 6 Committee is attempting to prove that Trump knew he had lost the election, but misled his followers to believe in what others have called his Big Lie. Is there a willingness on the part of "followers" to believe anything their "leader" tells them? We'll never know the factual truth about Moses and the stone tablets, but we actually have factual data about the truth or falsehood of Trump's contention that the election was stolen from him. As Bennie Thompson, chair of the January 6 committee said, "Numbers don't lie." It doesn't matter what millions of Trump supporters believe because beliefs have to be measured with respect to objective facts whenever they're available, and in this case they are. With respect to religion we are free to believe whatever we want since there are no objective facts available no matter how hard anyone wants to believe that their beliefs are in fact the true facts.

So why do people believe stuff that isn't true? Why did all those people believe that the Emperor's new clothes were in fact a most wonderful set of threads? It took a little boy to point out that the Emperor was in fact naked. People will tend to believe whatever a person in power tells them because they don't want to be punished either directly or by other believers who could make them social outcasts for not believing what all of the rest of them believe. You don't want to say the Emperor is a fake if the Emperor could throw you in prison or worse. People didn't contradict the Roman Caesars when they told them they were actually gods. A lot of the wars have been between groups with contrary religious beliefs. After the Protestant Reformation, there followed the Thirty Years war in Europe between Catholics and Protestants. The war in Yugoslavia was among three religious groups: Eastern Orthodox Christians, Roman Catholics and Muslims. They were all ethnically the same southern Slavs, the only difference among them which resulted in them killing each other was in their professed religious beliefs. Croats were largely Roman Catholic, Serbs were mostly Eastern Orthodox and Bosnia is majority Islamic. Different religious beliefs have resulted historically in human beings killing each other.

Trump's Big Lie resulted in his true believer followers almost fomenting a successful coup on January 6. It also helped Trump and other Republicans raise huge amounts of campaign cash from his followers based on their belief that the election was stolen from their "leader." Tolerance among people with different religious beliefs is a necessary component if earthlings ever hope to attain Peace on Earth, Good Will Among Men (and Women). Democracy is based on an accurate counting of votes. It's all about the numbers. It's not about beliefs. It's not about believing what some leader tells you to believe. Objectivity and science establish what is undisputedly true. Fortunately, democracy has a way to establish what is objectively true. Religion doesn't.

Why it must happen soon: The United States vs. Donald J. Trump

Merrick Garland must do it now, before it's too late

Robert Reich

 

On Friday, Trump endorsed J.D. Vance in the Ohio Senate Republican primary. This follows his endorsement of Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania’s Senate Republican primary and Herschel Walker in the Georgia Senate race. The press has framed these endorsements as long-shot bets that “could put [Trump’s] desired image as a kingmaker at risk.” But this misses the point. What’s really at stake for Trump is the selling of Trump and his big lie that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

 

To be endorsed by Trump, candidates apparently must fulfill three prerequisites: 1) They have to be running in swing states whose primaries and general elections will attract lots of media attention. 2) They must be totally committed to Trump and his big lie. And 3) they must have shown themselves capable of promoting Trump and his lie with the kind of celebrity pizzaz that sells well on television.

Vance — celebrity author of “Hillbilly Elegy” — was originally appalled by Trump and his lie, and said so. But now that he’s running for the Senate, Vance has become one of the most forceful promoters of Trump and articulate peddlers of his big lie. As Trump noted about Vance, “he gets it now.”

Oz is a celebrity television doctor who has over the years come under fire for bogus on-air medical advice, which makes him perfect for promoting Trump and his big lie, too. Trump admires Oz’s television bona fides: “They liked him for a long time,” Trump said of Oz at a rally in Pennsylvania last week. “That’s like a poll. You know, when you’re in television for 18 years, that’s like a poll. That means people like you.”

Walker fits the criteria, as well. He was both a college and NFL star.

Trump couldn’t care less whether he’s viewed as a “kingmaker” by the press and politicians inside the Beltway. He cares only about his narcissistic need to delegitimize the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. And he has a knack for recognizing ambitious, unprincipled, television-savvy hucksters who will help him.

Let me pause here to emphasize two things that are too easily forgotten. First, no one to this day has produced even a shred of evidence that fraud affected the results of the 2020 election. Sixty federal judges, along with Trump’s own departments of justice and homeland security, have concluded that Biden won fair and square.

Second, the lynchpin of democracy is the peaceful transition of power from those who lose elections to those who win them. Yet it’s been over a year and half since Trump has refused to concede — continuously spreading his big lie that the election was stolen, pushing public officials at all levels of government to overturn the election, and instigating an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on the day Congress was to certify the election results. As Federal District Court Judge David Carter stated in a recent opinion, “[T]he Court finds it more likely than not that President Trump corruptly attempted to obstruct the Joint Session of Congress on January 6, 2021.”

Trump is already well on the way to rebuilding the Republican Party around his big lie. He is purging the GOP of his critics and installing loyalists in key state positions. And he is inspiring GOP-state legislatures to enact election sabotage laws that will give Trump and his supporters opportunities to rig congressional election results. The upcoming 2022 congressional elections will serve as proving grounds for his attempt to steal the 2024 presidential election.

Trump is a growing menace to our system of self-government. The longer he goes without being held accountable for what he has done, the more danger he poses.

The critical question, then, is whether Attorney General Merrick Garland will bring criminal charges against him — and when. The window of opportunity is closing fast. The House Select Committee on January 6 will be holding public hearings in a few weeks and report its findings thereafter. (The committee has already collected nearly 10,000 documents and conducted more than 860 depositions and interviews, including with Trump family members and his close associates.) If Republicans take over the House in the midterm elections, they are sure to close down the inquiry.

Moreover, immediately after the midterm elections, America will be in the gravitational pull of the 2024 presidential primaries — in which Trump will almost certainly play a leading role, unless he is indicted and convicted. He has already amassed a campaign chest of more than $120 million, more than double that of the Republican National Committee. During the last six months of 2021, his PAC raised more money online than the GOP every day but two. And once he is a declared candidate, it will be impossible for Twitter, Facebook, and other social media platforms to stop him from engulfing them with his lies.

Some say Garland should not bring criminal charges against Trump because criminal charges have never before been brought against a former president. This is a specious argument because no former president has ever before attempted to overthrow a duly elected President — the first attempted coup in the 233-year history of the United States government.

Others worry that criminal charges against Trump — along with a trial and possible imprisonment — would only deepen the fierce partisan divide that’s already drained trust out of much of American democracy. This is a legitimate concern. But failure to hold Trump accountable for what he has done would pose a far greater risk for American democracy — permanently entrenching distrust in our election system and legitimizing future battles over every contest, possibly provoking repeated rounds of violence.

Trump’s indictment and conviction must occur as quickly as possible. The upcoming midterm elections won’t simply be a battle between Republicans and Democrats. They will be a battle between Trump acolytes and fair election supporters over protecting the integrity of our elections and our democracy. The sooner Trump is held accountable for his criminality, the safer American democracy will be.

Off the Top of My Head

Trump Reverses Advice on COVID Vaccinations

by John Lawrence

Since most of the anti-vaxxers are Trump voters and mostly the unvaccinated are the ones who are dying, Trump voters are dying off faster than Biden votes. Sensing this, Trump has recently reversed course and told people to get vaccinated. However, Trump was booed when he suggested getting vaccinated which goes to prove that once you've invested heavily in a particular point of view, it's not easy to all of a sudden do a 180 and tell people something different. So as the pandemic gets drawn out mainly due to Trump's base not getting vaccinated,Trump is sweating it that so many of his supporters are dying from COVID. Of course Democrats aren't too chagrined when another Trump voter bites the dust. They are keeping up their steady drumbeat of investigating the January 6 insurrection and compiling damning evidence that Trump and many of his henchmen were complicit in it. It didn't just happen spontaneously. It seems that much planning went into it.

At the same time the southern district of New York is looking into the dealings of the Trump business empire. They are finding the shocking revelations that it was based on defrauding both investors and the IRS. When it came to a valuation of a particular property, Trump told the IRS that it was practically worthless while inflating its value when it came to getting loans from a bank with that property as collateral. That's a pretty neat trick if you can pull it off, but it seems that now the chickens are coming home to roost, and Trump's main hope is that his base will continue to send him money. Fundraising is of the essence when all else fails. It leaves me wondering if all of Trump's shenanigans could land him in jail. He seems to have more escapes hatches than a cat has lives. He is a slippery eel indeed. Even though he has done this dastardly deed and that dastardly deed, it is as though none of them come with criminal penalties. The crucial question is "Can he go to jail for that?" After decrying to the max something Trump has done, when asked, the same pundit is apt to reply "No" with a bemused look on his or her face.

Evidently, defrauding investors and underpaying taxes is so routine with the Trump organization that it has ceased to be a bombshell revelation. It has become so normalized that nobody goes to jail for it especially an ex-President of the United States. As Nixon said, "When you're President, it's not a crime." The Nixon interviews were a series of conversations between former American president Richard Nixon and British journalist David Frost. They were recorded and broadcast on television and radio in four programs in 1977. In part 3, Frost asked Nixon whether the president could do something illegal in certain situations such as against antiwar groups and others if he decides "it's in the best interests of the nation or something". Nixon replied: "Well, when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal". The criminal implications of Trump's misdeeds seem to fall into the same category. If the President of the United States does it, you can't send him to jail.

The question is could Trump run for President in 2024 if he is sitting in jail or convicted of a felony? There seems to be nothing in the Constitution that forbids it. So it's possible that the American people and indeed the people of the world could be treated to the spectacle that an elected President could be commander-in-chief while presiding from a jail cell.

Off the Top of My Head

The BIG LIE

by John Lawrence

A lot of people still believe the Big Lie - that Joe Biden didn't legitimately win the election. What isn't talked about is all the other Big Lies which the Republican party has been telling their constituents for years: the Big Lie that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11, the Big Lie that Obama was born in Kenya, the Big Lie about selling arms to Iran to benefit the Contras, the Big Lie represented by the Gulf of Tonkin resolution which escalated  the Vietnam war (OK that was Johnson, a Democrat), the Big Lie that Hillary was responsible for the death of White House attorney Vince Foster, the Big Lie that Hillary ran a child sex ring in a pizza restaurant and much more. There are more Big Lies, most of them associated with Republicans, especially Republican Presidents George W Bush, Ronald Reagan and Dick Nixon (his Big Lie was "I am not a crook.").

Lying is part and parcel of the way Republicans do business. How else to get a bunch of people to vote against their own real interests? Republicans have trained their base to respond favorably to them based on lies. Lies are usually juicier than the truth. The truth is often very mundane and quotidian. The truth is that Hillary was a very experienced and capable public servant. That's not too exciting. And then there was George H W Bush's dog whistle racist campaign ad about Willy Horton, a murderer who escaped prison on a week-end pass devised by his opponent Michael Dukakis. Racism probably won Bush the Presidency.

George W Bush was determined to invade Iraq. He went out of his way to no avail to pin 9/11 on Saddam. When no evidence could be found of this, he fabricated evidence that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. In The Untold History of the United States, the authors write:

"Lacking evidence, they manufactured their own. Cheney and Libby pointed repeatedly to a meeting in Prague between the hijacker Mohamed Atta and an Iraqi intelligence official, even though Tenet had proved that Atta was in the United States at the time of the alleged meeting, living in Virginia in the shadow of CIA headquarters. ...

"Using this kind of notoriously false information, the administration challenged the findings of CIA analysts and UN weapons inspectors and tirelessly made its case for invading Iraq. "We know they have weapons of mass destruction," Rumsfield insisted. "There isn't any debate about it." In early October 2002, Bush, echoing a similar warning from Rice a month before, announced, "we cannot wait for the final proof - the smoking gun - that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud." But no one could outdo Cheney when it came to outright fabrications and dire prognostications:

"'The Iraqi regime has ... been very busy in enhancing its capabilities in the field of chemical and biological agents, and they continue to pursue the nuclear program. ... Armed with an arsenal of these weapons of terror and a seat at a top [sic] 10 percent of the world's oil reserves, Saddam Hussein could then be expected to seek domination of the entire Middle East, take control of a great portion of the world's energy supplies, directly threaten America's friends throughout the region and subject the United States or any other nation to nuclear blackmail. Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction; there is no doubt that he is amassing them to use against our friends, our allies and us.'"

Of course after the invasion no weapons of mass destruction were actually found. Recently deceased and highly decorated General Colin Powell was sent forth to argue about the existence of WMD in Iraq. The authors continue:

"But the most ignominious moment came on February 5, 2003, when Secretary of State Colin Powell, the most respected and trusted member of the administration, went before the United Nations and made the case for war. Bush had handpicked Powell for the job. "You have the credibility to do this," he told Powell. "Maybe they'll believe you." ...

"It was a thoroughly shameful performance that Powell later called a low point in his career. ... Members of the intelligence community were outraged over Pentagon neocons' hijacking, distorting and fabricating intelligence. When the nonexistent WMD failed to materialize, New York Time columnist Nicholas Kristof described them as "spitting mad" and eager to have their say. One lashed out, "As an employee of the Defense Intelligence Agency, I know that this administration has lied to the public to get support for its attacks on Iraq."

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder said, "As we know today, the Bush administration's reasons for the Iraq war were based on lies."

George W Bush's Big Lie cost a lot of American and Iraqi lives. So far Trump's Big Lie has cost the lives of relatively few Capitol policemen. But the stage is set for an assault on American democracy itself. The perpetration of Trump's Big Lie is being carried on by his henchmen in Congress and in the media. Their use of symbols such as flags in the January 6 insurrection is reminiscent of all the flags, symbols and pageantry of Nazi Germany, much of which was designed by Hitler himself who was an artist who failed to gain entrance to the Munich University before aspiring to world domination. The cries of "We're Number 1" by the insurrectionists and other bellicose Americans are echoes of their predecessors' cries of "Heil Hitler."

Off the Top of My Head

Omigod, Omicron

by John Lawrence

Omicron is the 15th letter of the Greek alphabet. This means that there have been 14 variants of COVID starting with alpha, right? Well, almost right. They left out two letters - "nu" and "xi." "Nu" because COVID is anything but new after two years of infectiousness and "xi" because, well, you can't offend one of the leaders of a major country. So starting off the year of our Lord 2022, the people of the world are in worse shape than when we started 2021. There have been too many false starts at a return to normalcy. Just when we were told it was safe for grandparents to hug their grandchildren again, grandchildren gave their grandparents COVID, and they died. It's mainly the old who are doing the dying. Nothing new there. First we were all supposed to look forward to last July 4 when we could gather safely. Then it was Christmas. If there's anything that's a safe bet, it's that there aren't any safe bets when it comes to predicting when COVID will be over.

Two things can be said without controversy. 1) Those who are vaccinated and boosted are in better shape than those who aren't. It's mainly the unvaccinated, in addition to the elderly, who are doing the dying. 2) The worst may be yet to come. We don't know how many more variants are potentially out there waiting in the wings to do havoc to the human race. It's the unvaccinated of the world - not just the US - who are the petri dish where COVID is experimenting with even more deadly and contagious variants. Make no mistake. The virus wants to kill as many humans as it can. So buckle up. As Yogi Berra famously said, "It ain't over till it's over."

I think back to Steve Martin's famous SNL Christmas skit. If I had 3 wishes, the first would be that all the children of the world would join hands in the spirit of peace and love and sing "We are the world." My second wish would be that the world is rid of the COVID pandemic. My third wish is that Trump would be convicted of a crime and go to jail so that he would never be President again. No, wait. There is nothing in the Constitution which prevents a convicted felon from being President of the US. My third wish would be that Congress would pass a law that Trump could never be President again. That ought to do it. But what if a new Republican Congress takes over? They could even change the law! Trump could even conceivably run for President from jail. Then when he won the Presidency, he could pardon himself and get out to wreak havoc on the world again. My first wish, however, remains that all the children of the world would join hands in the spirit of peace and love and sing "We are the world." If I had another wish it would be that all the children of the world could solve the problem of climate change so that they could live in a habitable world and not lose their lives and material possessions in wildfires, floods, hurricanes and other natural disasters.

In the meantime the only thing that is guaranteed to prevent COVID is not masks, not tests, not social distancing, not even vaccinations. It is to isolate yourself completely. Happy New Year!

Off the Top of My Head

Cooperation Among Virtual Enemies on Climate Change Next to Impossible

by John Lawrence

Can we stop fighting as the human race has been doing for millenia because we have a common problem that calls for cooperation: climate change? The human race and in particular nation states have never been able to cooperate on a world wide basis. What's more almost every aspect of contemporary society needs to be changed in order for planet earth to be rescued. For instance, the third largest greenhouse gas polluter after the US and China is cattle. Yes, cattle worldwide emit more carbon dioxide equivalents in the form of methane than any country on earth with the exception of the US and China. We should all stop eating beef immediately. How likely is that to happen? And then there's cooperation between the US and China, between the US and Russia. We can't chastise and sanction these countries and then expect them to cooperate with the western world when it comes to climate change.  Time magazine reported:

"From his first months as Secretary of State under Obama, Kerry set out to build a bridge to China on climate while tensions festered on other matters, putting the issue at the center of the relationship. In 2014, in Beijing, Chinese President Xi Jinping and President Barack Obama, with Kerry by his side, announced agenda-setting plans to cut emissions, effectively inviting other countries to get on the same page. On the back of Kerry’s climate diplomacy, Obama and Xi feted each other a year later at a state dinner in Washington—perhaps the zenith of relations between the two countries in recent years. In the early days of the Biden Administration, longtime watchers of international climate politics speculated about whether Kerry would try to repeat that effort. Kerry told me that from the outset he knew that wouldn’t be possible—the Trump presidency had spoiled the well, and, while less vociferous, Biden hasn’t sought to placate China. “It’s a very, very different time now,” Kerry says. “It’s a very different set of political circumstances.”

"Instead, he sought a subtler form of rapprochement, traveling to China in April, becoming the first senior U.S. official to visit since the start of the pandemic. His message, he says, was to create a lane for climate collaboration amid the iciness. The reception was a sharp contrast from the jubilant atmosphere at the state dinner six years earlier. The two parties released a joint statement, agreeing to cooperate but not much more. Then in September, after making the 7,000-mile trip to Tianjin, Kerry encountered even more tense feelings. Despite the long journey, China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi only met with him virtually, and said that climate collaboration could not be an “oasis” away from the other rifts in the relationship. “If the oasis is surrounded by desert, sooner or later the oasis will also become desert,” he said."

The crucial points are "Trump spoiled the well" and “If the oasis is surrounded by desert, sooner or later the oasis will also become desert”. Trump set the world back years when it comes to climate change. What will he do if elected President in 2024? The Chinese Foreign Minister's point is that you can't seek cooperation on climate change while at the same time fomenting a chilly relationship verging on a Cold War which the Pentagon is trying to do. For that matter how can we rely on China to produce the major amount of consumer goods for the US while trying to give China orders about how it is to conduct itself on the world stage. It just doesn't compute. You can't compartmentalize a relationship to that extent.

The other point is that how can the rest of the world believe what we say about the urgency of doing something about climate change which entails sacrifice while at the same time holding open the possibility that a climate change denier might be elected President in 2024?

Off the Top of My Head

If Trump Didn't Commit Treason, What is Treason?

by John Lawrence

It's clear Trump tried to overthrow the results of the 2020 election and fomented a coup to keep himself in power. I'd like to know why that isn't treason and why Trump is not in jail. It would have to be done by Democrats because now the government IS Democrats. Republicans don't even participate except to try to roadblock everything Democrats try to do. So Democrats would have to put Trump in prison, and I think they are afraid to do so. Wishy washiness is their name. First Trump's famous call to Raffensberger, Secretary of State of Georgia, in which he implored him to "find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have". Then his attempt to corrupt the Department of Justice in order to get it to declare the election was corrupt, then his attempt to get Pence to not certify Biden's victory and on and on. There is so much documented proof that Trump did all of these things and more not to mention fomenting a coup on January 6. I repeat why isn't he in jail and being tried on charges of treason?

Trump is not only not in jail, he's contemplating another run for President in 2024. The US cannot withstand another run for President by Trump. The scenarios for future coups will make January 6 look like a dry run. Republican states have already changed laws making it more likely that state legislatures can take over elections and select their own slate of electors if they don't like the outcome of the voting process. Trump and his cronies have already cast doubt on the validity of elections. Poll workers have already received death threats as has anyone else connected with the democratic process or anyone who stood in the way of Trump's attempted coup. The January 6 committee will dig up enough dirt to put Trump in jail, but I doubt if they will go all the way and get that done. Democrats are too afraid of the reaction of Trump's supporters if they put him in jail. They're afraid it will look like a partisan effort. Well, it will be because there is no Republican support for chastising Trump in any way whatsoever. But that shouldn't stop Democrats and maybe Liz Cheney from doing the right thing.

Finally, just tell me what treason is if it is not all the things Trump did to overthrow a democratically elected government in the US. No wonder the rest of the world doesn't trust us.

Off the Top of My Head

The Dumbing Down of the American Electorate

by John Lawrence

It seems that about half the American people want rational, competent government which advances the interests of the American people and plays a constructive role on the world stage. The other half wants a government based on their pet peeves. They are amenable to being swayed by conspiracy theories and misinformation. The former are mainly Democrats; the latter, Republicans. This is nowhere better exemplified than the 2016 election in which competence and experience in the form of Hillary Clinton was defeated by resentment and lies in the form of Donald Trump. In contrast to China which promotes the best and brightest to high positions in its government, the US form of democracy allows for politicians to appeal to the lowest common denominator which has no knowledge or information about anything beyond the worship of symbols like the American flag. This is clear from the visuals of the January 6 insurrection in which the American flag was displayed ad infinitum as if that is what made these people true patriots who could demand that their hero, Donald Trump, should be President in defiance of every provision of American constitutional democracy.

Republican politicians pander to this group of no nothings and stoke resentment against intelligence and rationality which they define as elitism. Joe Six Pack is easily swayed to vote for someone like himself, a high school graduate who flunked civics class if he was even required to take a civics class. American history was taught from the point of view of white Europeans with hardly a mention of the lands stolen from Native Americans nor the travails of African American slaves who provided the labor to build most of the country and make white southern plantation owners rich. The diaspora of southern Confederate attitudes to much of the rest of the country other than the coasts has provided the grist for Republican politicians to convince this diaspora to vote against their own economic interests and to fully indulge their anger and resentment against those they call elitists who have much more knowledge, education and intelligence while at the same time really smart lawyers and operatives work to advance the interests of the very rich unbeknownst to the Joe Six Packs who voted for them.

When half the country votes based on conspiracy theories which the Republican party amplifies, what is the solution? More education for one thing. The January 6 insurrectionists sent to jail for their crimes need to be reeducated. They should be required to take a course on contemporary issues of American society and also a course on World Problems. Many Americans are so insular that they never even stop to consider what's going on in the rest of the world. It's not enough to start educating children; many adults need to be reeducated. If this smacks of what the Chinese are doing to the Uighurs, it bears the similarity in the sense that many American adults do need to be reeducated, and their sentences should require it because many of them have been miseducated in southern schools which elevate states' rights to a primary position in American democracy. Problems of American Democracy, a course my father taught at Highland Park High School, should be required from kindergarten through college. The American people need to become more sophisticated as citizens if democracy is to have a future. Otherwise, Republican politicians will continue to pander to the least common denominator stoking their resentments while stealing their futures unbeknownst to them. Competence, intelligence and good hearts will continue to be defeated. Republican politicians' skill set consists of getting their followers to vote against their own interests while pandering to their resentments. Democratic politicians, for the most part, actually want to help the American people and not just the ultra rich.

When one country promotes smart people to high positions in government, and another country is prone to electing people based on lies and conspiracy theories, which country do you think will prevail on the world stage? One party in this country is acting intelligently trying to advance the interests of the average American while the other party does everything in its power to stands in its way while basing its appeal on misinformation, lies and conspiracy theories. How did democracy ever descend to this level?

Off the Top of My Head

The Shortcomings of Democracy

by John Lawrence

What other countries are concerned about is the specter of Trump coming back in 2024 and reversing everything Biden will have accomplished specially with regard to climate change. An American government no matter how well intentioned and competent cannot maintain itself in power for a long time. It can be replaced by a malevolent and incompetent one in relatively short order. It almost makes you look on other forms of government with envy. Angela Merkel was in power in Germany for 16 years. She was a steady hand on the tiller. Trump tried to rip the tiller out of the ship and he may come back to try and do it again. It's not only China which has long term stability, but China has been pretty consistent in delivering for the Chinese people over a fairly long term. Their government is stable no matter what else you want to say about it. They also promote the best and the brightest to high positions in the government. Trump put in place agency heads that were dedicated to destroying the agencies they were in charge of and many were incompetent political cronies to boot.

Coherence, cohesion - these are values that do not apply to the American people. The American people are freedom fanatics, freedomaholics. In most other advanced societies the value of freedom is balanced by the value of social responsibility. When freedom is way out of proportion with other values, you have a society that can come apart at the seams which is what is happening to American society. The American system engenders a two party system by its very nature, and almost inevitably it develops into two parties which are diametrically opposed to each other. A parliamentary system of government gives rise to  many parties, and that is less likely to devolve into a major societal divisions.

The other thing that contributes to the divisiveness of American society is the American predilection for guns. The supposed right of every American to own and use a gun creates a situation where angry people with a penchant for freedom are more likely to use their gun if they don't get their own way. If they sense that some people are on the other side of a divided society, they feel justified and entitled to use their guns to demand that society conform to their values much in the some way that a divided society resorted eventually to a civil war in America's past. Right now militias and paramilitary units roam the streets similar to the situation in Germany that predated World War II. If a society can't control or prohibit the private accumulation of guns, if it even encourages it, nothing good can come from this situation. All the preliminary conditions are in play for eventual uprisings which, if organized and controlled from above, can have disastrous consequences for civil society.

Off the Top of My Head

Snake in the Grass Kyrsten Sinema Sells Out to Corporate Lobbyists

by John Lawrence

Corporations, especially the pharmaceutical, can thank Kyrsten Sinema for selling out to them. The least objectionable parts of Biden's Build Back Better plan are the ones Sinema vetoed. Biden's plan would have been much better if corporate lobbyists hadn't gotten to her. But not to worry. She's set for life with probable promises of corporate board positions paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for a few hours "work." With Democrats like her, we don't need Republicans. She's a Republican wolf in Democratic sheep's clothing. But never fear. Biden's Build Back Better Bill will eventually pass within the next couple of weeks, and it's still truly transformational. Too bad that every Democratic Senator had effectively a veto over any provision of it. Joe Mancin was at least up front with the public about his concerns, some of which were at least plausible. Sinema sprung her demands on Biden at the seeming last minute forcing him to renegotiate the whole deal and delaying the whole process. While pundits quibble over Biden's ratings, I don't think he's too concerned about that. He knows he has a BIG DEAL or a BIG FUCKING DEAL as he once whispered to Obama. He'll go down in history as a transformational President.

So what do the Republicans have to offer? Election denialism and insurrection denialism. It wouldn't be so bad except for the fact that they could spring back to life in two or maybe four years. Too bad for the rest of the world's confidence in America. Although the US decries Soviet and Chinese authoritarianism in which one leader can remain in power for a number of years, while the whole US relationship with the rest of the world could change every four, what about Angela Merkel, who remained in power for 16 years, in a putative democracy. Longevity of intent is not a function necessarily of type of government. The US is back? Biden would like to convince others it's so. But Trump has a different perspective which is that Biden's version of the US is back until he, Trump, takes over again in 2024. The US could veer wildly back and forth without any continuity whatsoever. While Democrats are doing their best to help families and bring the US into the modern world, Republicans offer warmed over conspiracy theories aided and abetted by social media. The US needs to get serious about denying Trump a chance of ever running again. In fact he should be in jail for attempting to overthrow a legitimately elected US government which is treason. Yes, the T word applies to him. The S word, sedition, as well. Yet as of now he can run again and possibly win in 2024.

I think that, after the twin Build Back Better bills finally pass, Democrats will turn their attention to voting rights. Will Sinema and Mancin go along with holding the filibuster in abeyance to get voting rights passed? That's the big question. If not, Democrats are sunk in 2022 and 2024. And so is the US as a world leader. The US will become a backwater and a latter day banana republic with an outsize military, corporate lobbyists run amuck and a fast fading US dollar as the world's reserve currency. Runaway global warming will be a given if Trump is elected again in 2024. The US will become a billionaire's paradise with unrestricted limits in economic inequality and a burgeoning homeless population that neither Republicans or Democrats seem to be able to do anything about. Rents will soar out of sight as more people live in their vehicles and on the streets without adequate sanitation. The rest of the developed world will leave the US in its dust, but they alone will not be able to solve the problem of climate change which will eventually make parts, if not all, of the earth uninhabitable. So there is a lot riding on a Federal voting rights bill overriding the Republican state efforts to gerrymander and restrict access to the ballot in order to favor the electability of Republicans.

Off the Top of My Head

Social Responsibility Was Not Written into the Constitution

by John Lawrence

The French demanded Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite in their revolutionary Constitution. Fraternite, social responsibility, was left out of the American Constitution. So now there are people who feel no social responsibility to get a vaccination so that they won't spread COVID to others, let alone protect themselves. A pandemic requires social cohesion, something that is unheard of in American society. Americans are extremely selfish and self-centered, something encouraged and exemplified by Republican Presidents like Donald Trump, Ronald Reagan and George W Bush and also by Ayn Rand and her advocates like Republican leader Paul Ryan and Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan. Greenspan, who served 4 terms as Federal Reserve Chairman, was a devoted Ayn Rand fan. He even took a six foot high floral arrangement shaped as a dollar sign to her funeral.  Rand’s conception was to create an individualist morality. Rand took traditional Christian morality, which said it was good to act in the interest of others—not in your own selfish interest—and she flipped that. She said selfishness is a virtue, and the goal of life is to grow and develop as an individual, and that a moral social system supports the rights of the individual above all. One of her books was called "The Virtue of Selfishness."

Service to our fellow man has been redefined in military terms. You serve American society by joining the military and killing other people who are not Americans. There is no conception of serving American society by joining the Peace Corps or AmeriCorps or doing anything that helps the weakest and most vulnerable among us let alone to plant trees or do anything to forestall climate change and benefit the environment. This culture of militarism, as the only way to exhibit patriotism, is what led to the January 6th insurrection. Militarism promotes the waving of flags and jingoism of "we're number one." Not only is there no conception of service to our fellow Americans, there is no conception of service to our fellow man. There is only pride in domination over those who are not American and people who are suspect of being weak or not American like Barack Obama, for instance. Dominance and selfishness are considered to be paramount virtues. Ask Donald Trump. Being number 2 or 3 or whatever is seen as being weak. Being a loser is weakness personified.

Long before Ayn Rand developed her ideas, Friedrich Nietsche set out more or less the same philosophy. His was about "the emergence of the superman." Nietzsche’s idea of the superman and its religious implications, was an attack upon and a rejection of Christian religion. His attack on religious moral ideals, using the concept of the superman, sought to strip humanity/man of his religious nature. Nietzsche’s superman represents the highest principle of the development of humanity and the affirmation of man’s full potentialities. He posits the superman as a critique on Christian religion and the crisis of modernity. This is because, according to him, the Christian morality stifles the development, freedom and creativity of humanity/man, as well as making him dependent on faith. Consequently, he advocates for the total rejection and abolition of the Christian moral ideals in order to make way for the freedom of humanity/man and consequently the emergence of super-humanity. Both Hitler and Donald Trump (an Ayn Rand superfan) represented the superman that both Nietsche and Ayn Rand argued was the highest form of humanity. The January 6 insurrection illustrated how far some will go to place their superman in power. The antivaxxers represent how far some will go to maintain that they have no responsibility to their fellow man, only to themselves.

 

How Trump Might Save the Democrats

by Robert Reich

Monday, October 11, 2021

[Please consider subscribing to my substack, at robertreich.substack.com, from which the following is drawn]

The unofficial kickoff of the former guy’s presidential campaign was a rally Saturday night in Des Moines. Unfortunately for the GOP, Trump’s speech focused on his Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen rather than on Joe Biden, whose approval ratings keep sliding because of the Delta variant’s continuing impact as well as fumbles at the border and in exiting Afghanistan.

All indications are that Trump is going to cast the midterm elections as a referendum on himself rather than on Biden. That’s hardly surprising, given Trump’s sociopathic ego. He cast his entire presidency as a referendum on himself. 

What’s surprising is how quickly the rest of the Republican Party is falling prey to this. We’ve already observed it at the state level: Trump’s Big Lie has moved 18 Republican-dominated states to enact 33 laws suppressing the votes of likely Democratic voters, on the false pretext of eliminating “voter fraud” that doesn’t exist. Several of these state laws will also let Republican legislatures ignore future electoral results they dislike. Under the same pretext, Republican states have undertaken bogus “audits” of the 2020 election.

But for a brief time it seemed as if senior Republicans in Washington would try to move the party away from Trump. They now appear to have given up. Several who in January criticized him for provoking the Capitol insurrection are now defending him and minimizing the attempted coup – including, notably, Senator Chuck Grassley, who showed up at Saturday’s Des Moines rally, and former vice president Michael Pence, who is now minimizing and excusing the riot.

For Trump to make the midterm elections into a referendum on himself and his Big Lie is useful for the Democrats. It takes the focus off Biden, reminds Americans how vile the former president is, and forces Republicans to try to defend him. If you watched Fox News Sunday, you might have seen Chris Wallace repeatedly ask House Minority Whip Steve Scalise whether he thought the 2020 election was stolen, and Scalise repeatedly squirm to avoid answering the question.

Scalise also refused to say whether he would vote to hold in contempt of Congress Trump advisers, such as Steve Bannon, who are resisting subpoenas issued by the January 6 Committee. Bannon is invoking executive privilege, at Trump’s request — an absurd position because by the 2020 election Bannon hadn’t worked in the White House for years. 

January 6 Committee Chair Bennie Thompson and Vice Chair Liz Cheney say they “will not allow any witness to defy a lawful subpoena or attempt to run out the clock, and we will swiftly consider advancing a criminal contempt of Congress referral.”

This means even more of an ongoing focus on Trump and his attempted coup. Before Congress can refer a criminal contempt to the Justice Department for prosecution, the full House has to vote on it. So you can expect a near party-line vote, which will put Republicans further on record as supporting Trump and, by implication, others who instigated the insurrection. 

The criminal contempt of Congress statute, enacted in 1857 and only slightly modified since, provides that any person who willfully fails to comply with a properly issued committee subpoena for testimony or documents is punishable by a substantial fine and imprisonment for up to one year. Once the House votes in favor of criminal contempt, the Speaker is required to report it to the Department of Justice, which then determines whether to prosecute. (Unfortunately, Attorney General Merrick Garland so far has not distinguished himself for holding Trump or his cronies accountable for anything.)

House Republicans could soon find themselves in an even more awkward position as the January 6 Committee investigates the roles several of them played in the insurrection. Senate Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin has asked the committee to investigate the help Rep. Scott Perry gave Trump in pressuring the Justice Department to overturn the election, as well as Rep. Jim Jordan’s contacts with the White House before and during the insurrection. (You may remember that in the 2016 presidential election, Jordan, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, dug into allegations of impropriety at the FBI and Justice Department, and defended the power of the subpoena to compel testimony from executive-branch officials.)

The January 6 Committee also issued a subpoena last week to Ali Alexander, the leader of the pro-Trump “Stop the Steal” organization, who has claimed he worked on the pre-insurrection rally with several GOP lawmakers, including Reps. Paul Gosar, Mo Brooks, and Andy Biggs.

Trump’s speech in Iowa Saturday night suggests we’re already in the gravitational field of the 2024 midterms. But in making that speech mostly about himself, Trump may have given Democrats more leeway to do what Americans – including most Trump supporters – need them to do.

Off the Top of My Head

Trump Can't Be Allowed to Run Again

by John Lawrence

This man tried to overthrow the Constitution and precipitated an insurrection. If he runs again, it'll be the end of Constitutional democracy in America. What is treason if it is not attempting to overturn the results of an election? Let's start with the fact that he asked the Secretary of State of Georgia to find him 11,000 more votes so he would have one more vote than Biden in that crucial state. But that's only the beginning, folks. It gets worse from there. CNN reported: "A conservative lawyer working with then-President Donald Trump's legal team tried to convince then-Vice President Mike Pence that he could overturn the election results on January 6 when Congress counted the Electoral College votes by throwing out electors from seven states, according to the new book "Peril" from Washington Post journalists Bob Woodward and Robert Costa." An attempt at election fraud is enough not only to disqualify Trump from ever holding public office again. It is also sufficient, in my opinion, for him to be tried for treason. The January 6 Committee is on course to bring out all the sordid facts, but, if they don't also go further and "disbar" Trump from ever running for public office, they will not have gone far enough. After all Clinton was disbarred for having sex in the oval office, a minor offense compared to what Trump has done.

If Trump should run again, he will undoubtedly call the election results another "Big Lie" unless he should happen to win of course which I don't think he would. Trump's base although sizable is dwindling to a certain hard core. Most Democrats and independents will not vote for him, but, if he runs again, there will be trouble. Another civil war is not out of the question. In order to avert one, the January 6 committee needs to run the course of its investigation and then to take action to prevent Trump from ever holding public office again. Better to nip this cancer on the Constitution in the bud than face the consequences of a man running for public office that is fully capable of precipitating another crisis. Trump has not even accepted the fact that he lost the last election. Imagine how he could whip up crowds if he wouldn't accept the results of the next election.

The book, "Peril" pointed out:

"The Eastman memo laid out a six-step plan for Pence to overturn the election for Trump, which included throwing out the results in seven states because they allegedly had competing electors. In fact, no state had actually put forward an alternate slate of electors -- there were merely Trump allies claiming without any authority to be electors.

 

"Under Eastman's scheme, Pence would have declared Trump the winner with more Electoral College votes after the seven states were thrown out, at 232 votes to 222. Anticipating "howls" from Democrats protesting the overturning of the election, the memo proposes, Pence would instead say that no candidate had reached 270 votes in the Electoral College. That would throw the election to the House of Representatives, where each state would get one vote. Since Republicans controlled 26 state delegations, a majority could vote for Trump to win the election."

 

So Democrats should treat the present situation as the preamble to a possible civil war in which they hold most of the cards because they control the government. They should do everything possible to neuter Trump and his cronies lest they should rear their ugly heads again in 2024 at which time they will be a more formidable force. It's not so much about politics as it is about whether or not the US will remain a democracy focused on solving the problems of average Americans and remains a constructive force in solving the problems of planet Earth like global warming. If Clinton could be disbarred for sex, Trump needs to be disbarred from ever running again, sex being the least of his transgressions.

Off the Top of My Head

If Bill Clinton Was Disbarred for Having Sex, Trump Should Never Be Allowed to Hold Public Office Again for Violating the Constitution

by John Lawrence

Although they haven't driven in the final nail, it's becoming obvious that Trump deliberately tried to overthrow the election thus violating the Constitution. In addition to Trump's violating his oath to defend and protect the Constitution, he has considerable financial problems especially in regard to violating tax laws. Seven Springs, a 213-acre swath of nature surrounding a Georgian-style mansion, is a subject of two state investigations: a criminal probe by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. and a civil inquiry by New York Attorney General Letitia James. In addition to that Trump owes hundreds of millions in loans coming due in the near future. Mother Jones reported:

"The insurrection, which Trump openly egged on, changed the calculus for many of the businesses that deal with Trump. In the aftermath of the attack, nearly all of the financial institutions that Trump dealt with said they would no longer do business with him. In fact, a number of his financial partners, including a small bank in Florida that was his most recent lender, announced they would close his accounts and return his money. Even the PGA, pulled its 2022 championship from Trump’s Bedminster, New Jersey golf course. Meanwhile, numerous tenants of Trump properties said they would be moving out, meaning his building would no longer look so appealing to investors who don’t care about associating with Trump."

Now compare Trump's outright violation of his oath of office and attempt to foment a coup with Bill Clinton's punishment for having oral sex with an intern. The Guardian reported:

"The US supreme court yesterday issued an order disbarring former president Bill Clinton from practising law before the high court. The ruling is seen as marking the official end of the Monica Lewinsky scandal. The ruling struck a jarring note in the current mood of national unity. Mr Clinton has been praised for the supportive role he has been playing and the way he has thrown his political weight behind President George Bush. The court did not explain its reasons for the disbarment, although such a decision usually follows disbarment in a lower court. In April, Mr Clinton's Arkansas law licence was suspended for five years and he was given a $25,000 fine."

Having illicit sex was the least of Trump's offenses. Remember the Access Hollywood tape? Yet compared to Bill Clinton, Trump has paid no penalty whatsoever ... yet ... for attempting to overthrow the US government. In the final analysis it might be tax evasion and misleading investors that gets Trump. Seven Springs caught investigators’ attention after Trump’s longtime personal lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen told a congressional committee in 2019 that Trump had a habit of manipulating property values — inflating them in some cases and minimizing them in others to gain favorable loan terms and tax benefits. Remember, the authorities got Al Capone on tax evasion. In any event Trump should be prohibited from ever holding public office including the Presidency again.

Off the Top of My Head

The Militarization of the American Mind

by John Lawrence

From seemingly rational thought processes that would make it impossible to end the war in Afghanistan to the insurrection at the Capitol to the "American movie" chock full of violence to the "well regulated militia" justification of gun proliferation, there is no end of rationalizations for the American military-industrial complex and gun culture on every level. Why does it come as a surprise to some journalists that many participants in the January 6 insurrection were current or ex military or police officers? They are exactly the ones with the mind set that believes Trump won the election, and that it was OK to do what their leader commanded them to do - invade the Capitol. The Generals who say that Biden shouldn't end the Afghanistan war on the grounds that the Kabul government will collapse are exactly the ones that argued we shouldn't end the Vietnam war because the South Vietnam government would collapse. Sure when the US sets up a puppet government and then props it up with money and a military presence, it probably will collapse when the US leaves that country which it never should have invaded in the first place. Afghanistan is Vietnam all over again or as Yogi Berra would say deja vu all over again.

The division among Americans into two tribes can be understood in terms of the two paths Americans take after high school graduation. There are those who go to college and there are those who go into the military. Those are basically the two choices high school graduates have. Those who go to college are taught to think critically to some extent, while those who go into the military are taught to obey orders. Unfortunately, Trump, as their Commander-in-Chief gave them the order to invade the Capitol, and they felt justified in following it because that is what their training led them to do. The choice to go into the Peace Corps or AmeriCorp is not really viable for most high school graduates because the perks of going into the military greatly exceed the perks of going into more peaceful pursuits, and they are less glorious. This is also a characteristic of the militarization of the American civilian mind. The military-industrial complex including, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and Northrop Grumman, profits greatly from ongoing militarization and military thought processes, employs most of the college graduates and provides debate ending rationalizations for American military preparedness despite the fact that their extremely expensive hardware doesn't work half the time, and the threats to America are primarily cyber in nature as well as domestic terrorism.

The divide and contrast between high school graduates who go into the military and are taught to follow orders and those who go to college is reflected in the political divide between those on the right and those on the left.The military is all about symbolism including snappy uniforms, medals for valor in combat, saluting the flag and honoring themselves for their patriotism. On the left results in the improvement of the lives of the American people - and not just the elite civilian Officer's Corps - are more important than symbols of glory. They are more likely to question authority rather than unquestionably following orders. The January 6 insurrectionists were following Trump's orders at least that's what they were thinking in their own minds and by their own admission. I would like to see the FBI release to the public the number of insurrectionists who were military or former military. I bet that would be most of them, especially the males. A lot of ex military go into police work because of the familiarity with weaponry which they gained in the military. Since guns are a familiar way of life for them, naturally they become arch supporters of the Second Amendment, "well regulated" or not. They are used to classifying groups of people as either friendly or the enemy, and this mind set lends itself to police work.

In the final analysis, America is so used to being the world's policeman and profiting in various ways therefrom, that it is unthinkable that we should cooperate with our supposed adversaries to forestall global warming or to thwart future pandemics let alone the current one. We must always have an enemy or at least an adversary to justify our existence. A peaceful world in which everyone gets along and cooperates to solve the problems we earthlings face and have to deal with is unthinkable. Even though the US has a glut of vaccines while the rest of the world is begging for them, Americans feel free not to have their arms jabbed because after all they are free - free to be stupid, free to ignore the safety of other Americans and free to get infected with the virus and die taking others with them.. They just want to get back to normal entertaining themselves to death and ignoring totally any responsibility to their fellow citizens not to mention fellow citizens of the world, many of which they would like to maintain in their necessary roles as the enemy.

Dr. Fauci wondered why we couldn't all unite to fight the common enemy  - COVID - instead of fighting among ourselves about taking the vaccine. Uniting to fight a common enemy like COVID or climate change just isn't the way Americans and maybe humanity in general do things. We need to disagree even about things that are crucial for our continued existence as a species. As a nation we need an enemy whether it be Russia or China seemingly to justify our existence.

Off the Top of My Head

The Trouble With Belief Systems

by John Lawrence, March 28, 2021

Belief systems lead to cults. A cult can be defined as a group of people who all fervently believe the same things although there is no objective proof for any of their beliefs. People who believe Trump won the election are members of a cult. People who believe their religion is the only correct and true religion and everyone who does not accept their belief system is going to Hell are members of a cult. A lot of wars have been fought because members of one cult dehumanized members of another cult. The European wars of the 16th century were fought because Catholics and Protestants could not accept that there were people who did not have the same cult beliefs as they did. The 30 years war was a war between Protestants and Catholics. The Crusades were wars between Christians and Muslims. People who hold belief systems fervently cannot accept the fact that there are other people in the world who don't hold their same belief system.

There are some things that are unknowable, at least at this point in time, and they form fertile ground for some one or one to develop a belief system around. Charlatans and manipulators realize that there is money to be made by claiming to assuage peoples' anxieties. One of the biggest unknowables is what happens to us after we die. Another is is there a God or, if there is, is He a judgmental or a loving God? The Founding Fathers of the US, cognizant of the European wars of religion, were mainly Deists. They believed that God created the universe, but was not involved with it after that, the so-called "watchmaker God." Founders who fall into the category of Christian Deists include Washington, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson was more influenced by the reason-centred Enlightenment than either Adams or Washington. Jefferson also created his own version of the Bible. This Bible was focused only on Jesus, but none of his mystical works. It didn’t include major scenes like the resurrection or ascension to heaven, or miracles like turning water into wine or walking on water. Instead, Jefferson’s Bible focused on Jesus as a man of morals, a teacher whose truths were expressed without the help of miracles or the supernatural powers of God.

Because of our existential anxiety caused by not knowing what's going to happen to us after death or even in this life, belief systems have grown up and attracted adherents. Fervent belief systems are really cults as they exclude and dehumanize people with alternative beliefs. There is no objective proof, but people are willing to kill those who aren't members of their cult. This is from Britannica:

"Deists argued that human experience and rationality—rather than religious dogma and mystery—determine the validity of human beliefs. In his widely read The Age of Reason, Thomas Paine, the principal American exponent of Deism, called Christianity “a fable.” Paine, the protégé of Benjamin Franklin, denied “that the Almighty ever did communicate anything to man, by…speech,…language, or…vision.” Postulating a distant deity whom he called “Nature’s God” (a term also used in the Declaration of Independence), Paine declared in a “profession of faith”: I believe in one God, and no more; and I hope for happiness beyond this life. I believe in the equality of man; and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and in endeavoring to make our fellow-creatures happy.''"

The problem with the Trump "true believers" is that they have been sold a bill of goods by those who shamelessly have made money off of feeding this cult a bunch of lies. These people have been conditioned by means of their religion to have a certain set of beliefs which they are willing to fight over. These beliefs coincide with a way of life predicated on an American version of history and an American narrative in which America is a shining city on a hill and a beacon of veracity and truth to the rest of the world. They believe in an America also which is fundamentally white like it's always been in their minds, but that's not the reality any more. American history is not all that noble. Indians were robbed of their lands and Africans were brought here and used as slaves. After they were freed, supposedly, Jim Crow laws made sure that they remained second class citizens. So there is  clash of belief systems. There are those who think the great and noble sentiments expressed by our Founding Fathers should not apply to everyone equally and those who point out the hypocrisy of not doing so.

The problem really is with belief systems which turn into cults. The way forward is really the one expressed by Rodney King: "Can't we all just get along?" With deference to Mission Impossible: your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to make the world a better place for this and future generations without regard to belief systems or ideology. Your vaunted way of life, as perceived to have existed in the past, is irrelevant.

Off the Top of My Head

Republicans Are Restricting Voting Laws

by John Lawrence, February27, 2021

Republicans know that, if all eligible voters actually vote, they will lose. So they are busy at work at the state level to enact more restrictive voting laws making it as difficult as possible for people to vote. This will primarily affect Democratic voters, and they know that. They have been using voter suppression techniques ever since black people won the right to vote. They know that making voting easier will encourage more Democratic voters because many of them can't take a day off to go to the polls. So mail-in voting which was facilitated in many states because of the pandemic worked to their disadvantage. They are hurrying to correct that. Since Republicans control many state legislatures which set the voting rules, they are having a field day changing the laws so that they don't suffer any more humiliating defeats.

So Joe Biden needs to make the best of the two years he has during which Democrats control both Houses of Congress. Assuming that a Republican will be elected President in 2024, the nation will swerve to the right and disassemble all the Executive orders Biden has put in place. As a result of this division America will be seen, if it's not seen that way already, as unstable and inconsistent. World leaders will increasingly turn towards China for leadership because what China values most in consistency and stability. The US can't decide whether it wants to be a democracy or a republic. Democrats want a democracy in which it would seem appropriate that every citizen over the age of 18 should cast a vote. This should be made as easy and accessible as possible. Republicans, on the other hand, want a republic in which the levers of power are controlled by white Americans of European descant like they always have been and which the time honored methods of voter suppression of minorities and poor people remain fully in effect.

Paul Weyrich was an American conservative political activist and commentator, most notable for co-founding the Heritage Foundation and the Free Congress Foundation, both conservative think tanks.He famously said: "So many of our Christians have what I call the goo-goo syndrome: good government. They want everybody to vote. I don't want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of people, they never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down." Quite a revealing quote. He identifies with "Christians" but chastens them that they shouldn't want everyone to vote. The question I ask is 'what would Jesus say?' Would Jesus want everyone to vote or not? Probably Jesus would be in favor of democracy as compared with a conservative minority that wants everything kept the way it has always been "from the beginning of our country." It makes me doubt the validity of the Christian religion as practiced by the "moral majority" of right wing Christians in this country. Jesus was for the poor and disenfranchised. They're not.

America can not remain a great country on the world stage if it swerves back and forth every two years between Democrats who genuinely want to make America and the world a better place and "America First" Republicans who don't give a hoot about the rest of the world except to dominate it with an outsized military establishment. The US is veering on the edge of autocracy if 74 million voters want Trump as their President in 2024 and Republicans are successful in suppressing 7 million voters because that was the margin between Biden and Trump. Trump did considerable damage not only to the US reputation vis a vis the rest of the world, but also within the US itself. It is a question of whether the US is a fact based country run by intelligent people or a no nothing country based on lies and conspiracy theories while the rich steal everything in sight and Republicans give their hoi polloi supporters political entertainment to keep their anger stoked. The rest of the world has looked to America as the Rock of Gibralter in the past because of its consistency and stability and its promotion of human rights (except the human rights having to do with economic rights). They may be looking now towards China for stability and consistency and be more concerned about intelligent leadership and economic human rights, especially if they observe that America's touting of human rights eliminates those of black people.

Off the Top of My Head

Where Will the Republican Party Go From Here?

by John Lawrence

The Republican party is having an identity crisis. Will it be dedicated to the adulation of Donald Trump or will it be based on conservative principles? What are conservative principles? Is the US a Republic or a Democracy or an Autocracy? This whole situation comes about because of the shifting demographics of the US. Historically, the US has been based on rule by white European Americans who have been able to keep minorities including chiefly African Americans in check by various means including slavery, Jim Crow laws, domestic terrorism, red lining, exclusion from education opportunities, even unemployment which has been used by the Federal Reserve to control inflation. That is changing because now there are more educated minorities including immigrants from all over the world gaining positions of political and economic power. 216 companies on the Fortune 500 were founded by immigrants or their children.

Is it any wonder then that poor and middle class whites want to tamp down immigration and keep black people in their place which they have always successfully been able to do until now. A lot of Trump supporters are effectively saying to hell with democracy if it means a multicultural society in which we have to tolerate multiple religions and multiple ethnicities and multiple shades of skin so it's not a question for them of having a democracy or a republic or any kind of society based on some version of popular rule. They want white European American rule like they've always had. There is also the added impetus that most of the once good paying manufacturing jobs have gone elsewhere which leads to even more insularity. So Trump supporters are the real conservatives in the respect that they want to conserve a way of life in which white people and European Americans have all the advantages. They abhor a democracy in which their lifestyle, their religion and their prerogatives are not paramount.

The Mitch McConnell conservatives overlap with the Trump conservatives, but the former stand for the privileges not of the white majority necessarily but of the white elite, of the white wealthy. They are even liberal enough to let wealthy people of different colors into their club while assuring less fortunate Americans that they too, if they work hard enough, may one day gain privileged positions of power and wealth. Basically, they represent rich people and abhor the white rabble. The problem is that this branch of the Republican party is increasingly irrelevant to the problems that America and the world faces. They stand for a strong defense which has morphed into endless wars which have gone nowhere and have only made matters worse in areas of the world in which the US has inserted itself. They stand for a bloated military-industrial-intelligence complex which has proven its incompetence in that it wasn't even able to predict an insurrection at the US Capitol, much less even defend against it once the attack was underway. They have proven to be focused on the wrong problems despite having been lavished with trillion dollar budgets.

What else do "principled" conservatives stand for? Low taxes but modern economic theory has proven that government spending need not be predicated on or limited by tax receipts. They stand for maximizing the private sector and minimizing the public sector at a time when dealing with climate change and even traditional infrastructure rebuilding demands the opposite. They stand for aiding and abetting the rich which has driven economic inequality to new heights. So what would be the role of a revamped and principled Republican party? Probably just to be a Democratic party lite or a party that criticizes Democratic programs. But that wouldn't assuage the interests of most power hungry politicians nor would it excite many members of their base who demand an entertaining leader who is focused by means of dog whistle diplomacy on white power.

The Trump party is similar to the Know Nothing movement, formally known as the Native American Party (at that time meaning descendants of colonists or settlers, rather than Indigenous Americans) before 1855 and the American Party after 1855. It was a nativist political party and movement in the United States, which operated nationwide in the mid-1850s, originally starting as a secret society. It was primarily an anti-Catholic, anti-Irish, anti-immigration, populist and xenophobic movement. So naturally they would resent an Irish Catholic President even though now there have been two of them. Adherents to the movement were to simply reply "I know nothing" when asked about its specifics by outsiders, providing the group with its common name. Qanon anyone? Supporters of the Know Nothing movement believed that an alleged "Romanist" conspiracy was being planned to subvert civil and religious liberty in the United States, and sought to politically organize native-born Protestants in what they described as a defense of their traditional religious and political values. Sure enough sounds like the Trump base to me.

The question is will the US become a full fledged democracy and live up to its vaunted principles finally even though it traditionally never has or will it revert to some version of white European American rule by electing another entertaining autocrat. That may not be Trump who has been deplatformed from Twitter, his chief propaganda tool, and faces mounting legal challenges, but there are others waiting in the wings who will offer bells and whistles instead of sound programs that really benefit the American people as a whole. But do Americans want government based on democratic principles or neverending campaign rallies with flags, banners and chants? As my Dad used to say, we shall see what we shall see.

Off the Top of My Head

A Job Guarantee Would Win Over Trump Voters and Also Address Black Lives Matter

by John Lawrence, February 14, 2021

Joe Biden can win over disgruntled Trump voters with a job guarantee. There has been a lot of research indicating that, if government were the Employer of Last Resort (ELR) at say a wage of $15.00 an hour, this would save money on unemployment as well as setting a minimum wage. It's also the minimum wage called for in Biden's COVID relief bill. Robert Reich, Clinton's labor secretary says:

"[G]ive Republicans and independents every incentive to abandon the Trump cult.

"White working-class voters without college degrees who now comprise a large portion of it need good jobs and better futures. Many are understandably angry after being left behind in vast enclaves of unemployment and despair. They should not have to depend on Trump’s fact-free fanaticism in order to feel visible and respected.

"A jobs program on the scale necessary to bring many of them around will be expensive but worth the cost, especially when democracy hangs in the balance."

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said in his last letter requesting support for the “March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom”:

“It was obdurate government callousness to misery that first stoked the flames of rage and frustration. With unemployment a scourge in Negro ghettoes, the government still tinkers with half-hearted measures, refuses still to become employer of last resort. It asks the business community to solve the problems as though its past failures qualified it for success.”

It's clear that an ELT program would solve many problems not the least of which is wooing Trump voters to the Democratic party. Trump's appeal to them was partly that they had been left behind because jobs had been moved to China and Mexico and he was going to bring good paying manufacturing jobs back to America, something he never did or had a clue how to do. The ELR program will act as an automatic stabilizer adding jobs during a recession and eliminating them during an expansion when jobs will shift back to the private sector. All private employers would have to do is pay a wage slightly higher than the program wage of the ELR program which would effectively set the minimum wage. It has been thought that a certain level of unemployment was necessary to fight inflation, but that's not necessarily the case as jobs in the ELR program would not compete with jobs in the private sector. The program wage would be a floor below which wages could not drop.

The so-called "Phillips Curve" maintained that there was a trade-off between employment and inflation, that to achieve lower inflation you had to increase unemployment. The Bureau of Labor Statistics defines full employment as an economy in which the unemployment rate equals the nonaccelerating inflation rate of unemployment (NAIRU), no cyclical unemployment exists, and GDP is at its [full] potential. The Federal Reserve considers a base unemployment rate (the U-3 rate) of 5.0 to 5.2 percent as “full employment” in the economy. So government economists have been willing to trade off the misery of approximately 16 million unemployed people in order to achieve stable money. Those 16 million are mainly composed of African Americans. However, Modern Monetary Theory claims that this is not necessary. There are other policy tools to fight inflation. Taxes, for example, mainly targeted on the rich. Other countries such as Argentine and India have implemented ELR programs. The money spent would eliminate the need for food stamps, unemployment insurance and other government programs necessary to deal with poverty and homelessness. Anyone wanting a job could have one, and these jobs would be in areas like child and elder care where there is a need for additional workers.

'Subpoena Kevin McCarthy If You Have To': Democrats Urged to Bring Witnesses After Bombshell Report on Trump Call

Published on Saturday, February 13, 2021

by Common Dreams

"As evidence of Trump's behind-the-scenes sociopathy mounts, it becomes clearer that Dems must call witnesses."

by Jake Johnson, staff writer

 

53 Comments

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) walks back to his office from the Senate floor on U.S. Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. on Thursday, February 4, 2021. (Photo: Salwan Georges/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

Update:

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the lead House impeachment manager, said Saturday morning that his team will seek to subpoena Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-Wash.) to testify before the Senate about her knowledge of a phone conversation between Donald Trump and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) that took place during the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

"When McCarthy finally reached the president on January 6 and asked him to publicly and forcefully call off the riot, the president initially repeated the falsehood that it was antifa that had breached the Capitol," Herrera Beutler said in a statement late Friday. "McCarthy refuted that and told the president that these were Trump supporters. That's when, according to McCarthy, the president said, 'Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are.'"

The Senate voted by a margin of 55-45 Saturday morning to open the door to calling witnesses. Senators will soon vote on calling specific witnesses, including Herrera Beutler; Trump's defense team has threatened to call "lots" of witnesses, but their requests must be approved by the Senate.

"The significance of this development in the impeachment trial can't be overstated. We are now going to have witnesses. Each witness can lead to other witnesses and new information. This can also prompt others with new evidence to come forward voluntarily," tweeted Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.). "The focus for now is on Trump's conversation with Kevin McCarthy. That conversation goes to the critical issue of Trump's actions and state of mind after the rioters breached the Capitol."

Earlier:

Democratic House impeachment managers are facing growing public pressure to call witnesses to testify at Donald Trump's Senate impeachment trial in the wake of bombshell reporting on the former president's conversation with Republican House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy during the January 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol by a right-wing mob.

Progressive watchdog groups, as Common Dreams reported earlier this week, have been urging Democrats to call witnesses since before the start of the trial, but CNN's late Friday story on Trump's conversation with McCarthy added fuel to those demands.

During the phone call, according to CNN, Trump told the California Republican, "Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are," a comment that reportedly prompted a shouting match between the two GOP leaders as McCarthy pleaded with the then-president to speak out against the attack. Hours after the assault began, Trump finally released a video urging the insurrectionists to go home while praising them as "special."

"Trump's call with McCarthy is another powerful piece of evidence that Trump was on the side of the rioters attacking the Capitol," Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) tweeted late Friday. "He utterly failed his oath to protect and defend our nation. This should seal the conviction with every senator."

While the Democratic leadership is hoping for a speedy end to the trial in order to move forward with confirmation of President Joe Biden's nominees and legislative business—including coronavirus relief—critics argued Friday night that failure to call witnesses following news of Trump's remarks to McCarthy would be a dereliction of duty.

"Democrats should call Kevin McCarthy as a witness and have him testify under oath about this call," tweeted Judd Legum, author of the Popular Information newsletter. "I know they want to wrap this up but it won't take long. The American people deserve the truth."

After House impeachment managers, led by Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), delivered their striking case in support of convicting the former president for inciting a deadly insurrection against the U.S. government, several members of the Senate Democratic caucus said Thursday that witnesses would not be necessary.

"I feel like we've heard from enough witnesses," said Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), referring to interviews played during House Democrats' presentation. Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), who caucuses with Democrats, "I think the case has been made. I don't know what witnesses would add."

But observers argued that the new details of Trump's phone conversation with McCarthy indicate that compelling the House Republican leader and others to testify under oath could yield important new information. Calling witnesses would require a simple-majority vote in the Senate.

"As evidence of Trump's behind-the-scenes sociopathy mounts, it becomes clearer that Dems must call witnesses," said the Washington Post's Greg Sargent.

 

Others echoed that sentiment, pointing also to new reporting confirming that Trump was aware that former Vice President Mike Pence was in danger when he tweeted an attack on Pence during the mob assault.

In an appearance on MSNBC late Friday, Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) argued the new reporting "undermines the entire defense that the president's lawyers have put on" and said he would be open to calling witnesses to testify at the trial.

"I think [House impeachment managers] have established a slam-dunk case that the president incited violence for the purpose of overturning the election," said Van Hollen. "If they make a decision to call witnesses... obviously we would welcome that."

Watch:

Joining the growing chorus, Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) tweeted Saturday morning that "the House Managers should ask for witnesses to be called, including anyone who communicated with Donald Trump or [has] direct knowledge of his actions and state of mind while he was in the White House after the Capitol was breached and while the attempted coup was ongoing."

Democrats are expected to decide on whether to call witnesses at some point Saturday morning. As Politico reported, "If Democrats and Trump's team opt against calling witnesses on Saturday, the trial will move immediately to closing arguments, expected to last no more than four hours. That would set up a vote on the charge against Trump in the early afternoon."

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Cancel Perks for the Worst President in History

Monday, February 8, 2021

How should the nation respond to an ex-president who has incited an insurrection, brought our democracy to the brink of destruction, and left so much pain and suffering in his wake?

In addition to being convicted in the Senate, which could bar him from running for office again, he shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near the cushy benefits former presidents receive.

These benefits were created under the Former Presidents’ Act of 1958, which was drawn up after Harry Truman told the House Majority Leader that he was going broke. 

The benefits in the Former President’s Act now include a yearly pension of over $200,000, an annual $1 million travel budget, an annual $500,000 travel budget for spouses, an office “appropriately furnished and equipped,” and staff to operate that office – for the rest of the former president’s life.

But what about a twice-impeached former president who did everything he could to attack Black and brown communities, and ended his presidency by inciting an insurrection against the United States government? 

Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t think someone with that record should receive millions in taxpayer-funded benefits at all, let alone every single year for the rest of his life. 

Thankfully, it doesn’t have to happen: A simple majority in Congress can pass a law barring this ex-president from the normal perks afforded to former presidents. For the sake of the country, Congress must do so. 

He should also be barred from receiving national security briefings now that he’s left office. There is no reason that someone this dangerous should be privy to the highest levels of intelligence as a private citizen – especially given his looming legal and financial entanglements with foreign entities. He was already a national security risk in office; as a private citizen, there’s no telling what he would do with classified information. 

Fortunately, it doesn’t take an act of Congress to cut off access to briefings: It’s up to Joe Biden, and Joe Biden alone. He has the power to prevent his predecessor from receiving any and all national security briefings. For the sake of America and the world, he must do so.

Regardless of how the impeachment trial in the Senate ends, one thing is clear: Someone who has disgraced the office of the president so maliciously should not reap its amenities for the rest of his life.

No cushy benefits. No national security briefings. No perks for the worst president in history.

Off the Top of My Head

China Has Been Taking Over the World ... Peacefully

by John Lawrence, February 11, 2021

As Trump was retreating from multilateralism with his America First approach, China was winning friends and influencing people by building infrastruture in countries around the world with its Belt and Road initiative. This model put excess Chinese labor to work pulling their families out of poverty and set up the groundwork for increased trade and friendly relations with with other countries. Latest example: Latin America. Meanwhile, the US has not even been able to build infrastructure in its own country. Every four years, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) publishes The Report Card for America’s Infrastructure, which grades the current state of national infrastructure categories on a scale of A through F. In 2017, the U.S. infrastructure earned a D+ average. Stay tuned for a new report later this year. Infrastructure looms large because now it must be built out as green infrastructure replacing fossil fuel infrastructure.

In Latin America, America's so-called back yard, 19 countries have signed up for China's Belt and Road Initiative. The value of trade between China and Brazil, Latin America's largest country is $100 billion. China is South America's largest trading partner. Only Paraguay is not on board because they're the only South American country that recognizes Taiwan and not Beijing as the legitimate Chinese government. In 2019 Chinese companies invested $12.8 billion in Latin America concentrating on regional infrastructure such as ports, roads, dams and railways. Meanwhile, America was focused on its entertainment and consumerist economy, now partially defunct due to COVID. Chinese purchases of minerals and agricultural commodities helped South America get through the worst effects of the 2008 financial crisis. While the US had an orgy of financial speculation that created the 2008 financial crisis, China was powering on keeping its shoulder to the wheel, ear to the ground and nose to the grindstone building infrastructure and providing full employment for the Chinese people. As the US was relying on its military power to maintain its influence in the world, China was employing peaceful means to expand its influence. In 2020 the US spent $738 billion on defense, an additional $35 billion on nuclear weapons and and additional $80 billion on intelligence programs, none of which by the way provided intelligence on the assault on the Capitol although it had been discussed widely and openly on the web in prior weeks. Meanwhile, China's 2020 defense budget was $178 billion.

China's Cosco Shipping is building a new $3 billion port in Peru, and there are plans for a transcontinental railroad linking South America's Atlantic and Pacific coasts. Diplomatic opportunities for China have also been opened up due to COVID since China produces most of the world's PPE. The US was caught flat footed because it had to go hat in hand to China for PPE not much of which is manufactured domestically. Mask diplomacy has caused Washington to worry that China is gaining influence during the pandemic as China has provided PPE to 150 countries and 7 international organizations around the globe. While the US struggles to get vaccine into the arms of Americans, China has agreed to provide Pakistan with half a million doses of its Sinopharm vaccine free of charge. Time magazine reported:

"Yet China has won influence not by wielding sticks but by deftly distributing carrots. In Brazil, the region’s largest economy, bilateral trade with China rose from $2 billion in 2000 to $100 billion last year. Today, Brazil sends 30% of all exports to China, including 80% of its soybean crop and 60% of its iron ore. These entanglements are typically tightest with nations with goods to sell; China has supplied over $17 billion in financing to Argentina since 2007, according to Inter-American Dialogue, and is the world’s top importer of Argentine soybeans and beef.

"China is also now a preferred lender across the region. It hosts two international development banks–the Beijing-led Asian Infrastructure Development Bank (AIIB) and the New Development Bank (NDB) in Shanghai–that are both expanding their remit across the region. “Infrastructure development has shrunk the distance between Asia and Latin America,” AIIB president Jin Liqun tells TIME in his Beijing headquarters."

While China was deftly distributing carrots, the US was wielding sticks with Trump and Secretary of State Pompeo bullying the rest of the world to get them to fall in line behind the US. The US needs to cooperate with China to stave off the next big crisis - global warming - not start a new Cold War in an effort to overtake or compete with China. For the most part China has already won any competition to speak of by gaining cooperation and friendship with the rest of the world and achieving the world's largest economy while the US still struggles with COVID, its economy in shambles. "No country has put itself in a better position to become the world's renewable energy superpower than China,"says a recent report by the Global Commission on the Geopolitics of Energy Transformation. In Brazil China's State Grid Corp. is the largest power generation and distribution company, while China's Three Gorges, the world's largest hydropower provider, controls 17 out of 48 hydro plants and 11 wind farms.

Joe Biden is doing his best to backtrack from Trump's disastrous America First policy, but American foreign policy is still on the track that it views China as a competitor rather than a nation that should be cooperated with in order to meet the challenge of global warming. Rather than gearing up for a military confrontation or quibbling and squabbling over human rights, the US must adopt a less belligerent foreign policy and learn to get along with the other nations of the world even those who have not been historic allies. The US should cut back on its bloated military and military-complex spending and devote the savings to virus research and green infrastructure implementation at home and around the world in cooperation with China and other nations.

Why Biden Can’t Govern from the Center

by Robert Reich
Sunday, January 17, 2021

I keep hearing that Joe Biden will govern from the “center.” He has no choice, they say, because he’ll have razor-thin majorities in Congress and the Republican party has moved to the right.

Rubbish. I’ve served several Democratic presidents who have needed Republican votes. But the Republicans now in Congress are nothing like those I’ve dealt with. Most of today’s GOP live in a parallel universe. There’s no “center” between the reality-based world and theirs.

Last Wednesday, fully 95% of House Republicans voted against impeaching Trump for inciting insurrection, even after his attempted coup threatened their very lives.

The week before, immediately following the raid on the Capitol, more than 100 House Republicans and several Republican senators objected to the certification of Biden electors in two states on the basis of Trump’s lies about widespread fraud.

Prior to the raid, several Republican members of Congress repeated those lies on television and Twitter and at “Stop the Steal” events.

Trump has remade the Republican party into a white supremacist cult living within a counter-factual wonderland of lies and conspiracies.

According to various surveys, more than half of Republican voters – almost 40 million people – believe Trump won the 2020 race or aren’t sure who won; 45% support the storming of the Capitol; 57% say he should be the Republican candidate in 2024.

In this hermetically sealed cosmos, most Republicans believe Black Lives Matter protesters are violent, immigrants are dangerous and climate change doesn’t pose a threat. A growing fringe openly talks of redressing grievances through violence, including QAnon conspiracy theorists, of whom two are newly elected to Congress, who think Democrats are running a global child sex-trafficking operation.

How can Biden possibly be a “centrist” in this new political world?

There is no middle ground between lies and facts. There is no halfway point between civil discourse and violence. There is no midrange between democracy and fascism.

Biden must boldly and unreservedly speak truth, refuse to compromise with violent Trumpism and ceaselessly fight for democracy and inclusion.

Speaking truth means responding to the world as it is and denouncing the poisonous deceptions engulfing the right. It means repudiating false equivalences and “both sidesism” that gives equal weight to trumpery and truth. It means protecting and advancing science, standing on the side of logic, calling out deceit and impugning baseless conspiracy theories and those who abet them.

Refusing to compromise with violent Trumpism means renouncing the lawlessness of Trump and his enablers and punishing all who looted the public trust. It means convicting Trump of impeachable offenses and ensuring he can never again hold public office – not as a “distraction” from Biden’s agenda but as a central means of reestablishing civility, which must be a cornerstone of that agenda.

Strengthening democracy means getting big money out of politics, strengthening voting rights and fighting voter suppression in all its forms.

It means boldly advancing the needs of average people over the plutocrats and oligarchs, of the white working class as well as Black and Latino people. It means embracing the ongoing struggle for racial justice and the struggle of blue-collar workers whose fortunes have been declining for decades.

The moment calls for public investment on a scale far greater than necessary for Covid relief or “stimulus” – large enough to begin the restructuring of the economy. America needs to create a vast number of new jobs leading to higher wages, reversing racial exclusion as well as the downward trajectory of Americans whose anger and resentment Trump cynically exploited.

This would include universal early childhood education, universal access to the internet, world-class schools and public universities accessible to all. Converting to solar and wind energy and making America’s entire stock of housing and commercial buildings carbon neutral. Investing in basic research – the gateway to the technologies of the future as well as national security – along with public health and universal healthcare.

It is not a question of affordability. Such an agenda won’t burden future generations. It will reduce the burden on future generations.

It is a question of political will. It requires a recognition that there is no longer a “center” but a future based either on lies, violence and authoritarianism or on unyielding truth, unshakeable civility and radical inclusion. And it requires a passionate, uncompromising commitment to the latter.

Off the Top of My Head

Voltaire: Those who have the power to make you believe absurdities have the power to make you commit atrocities

by John Lawrence, January 19, 2020

Twitter took away Trump's source of power when it deplatformed him. He'll never have the same soapbox again. This was the most significant move in silencing Trump, more so than even an impeachment conviction. He must be deplatformed from all social media. I don't think someone who cried fire in a crowded theater is entitled to free speech just as someone who has murdered someone with a gun isn't entitled to own a gun despite the Second Amendment. So there you go. All this will happen in the background as Joe Biden rescues the US from COVID and a sucky economy. The economy is just fine for the rich. It's terrible for the poor and has been for years. For most U.S. workers, real wages have barely budged in decades. So Trump is well on his way to becoming a footnote to history, an incompetent grifter, who gained a following through entertaining lies appealing to lower middle class grievances. My prediction is that he won't pardon any of the people involved in the Capitol riot because, like him, they are losers. Winning would have been a complete takeover in a coup d'etat, not just a break-in and subsequent removal. When he told his followers "I will be there with you" what he probably meant was that he would come down there after Mike Pence had been hung and Nancy Pelosi had been executed. Then he would declare himself President for Life and install the My Pillow guy as vice President. Instead the name Trump is being eliminated from all the entities that Trump had branded like Trump Tower. The name has lost its cachet.

Joe Biden will put competent people into positions of power and responsibility not loyal political hacks like Trump did. A lot of this will go on behind the scenes while Joe implements the big initiatives: 100 million vaccinations in the first 100 days and a $1.9 trillion economic relief bill. Everything else is relatively minor. Money will be no object; incoming Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin, former Chairwoman of the Federal Reserve has said, "Go big." She knows what hitherto Fed Chairmen and Treasury Secretaries did not want you to know and that is that Deficits Don't Matter. (See The Deficit Myth by Stephanie Kelton.) They are by a roundabout process merely accounting entries on the Fed's balance sheet. As long as there is unused productive capacity in the economy, deficits can put people back to work doing productive things that the private sector will not do like building and repairing infrastructure. On Biden's first day he will rejoin the Paris climate accords. Money must be made available in a second massive economic bill after the $1.9 trillion relief bill so that the country can be transitioned from a fossil fuel economy to a renewable energy economy. So there will be a lot of deficit spending although a revision of the tax structure that makes the rich and corporations pay their fair share will offset some of this.

Trump faces a financial reckoning. In the book, Dark Towers, Deutsche Bank, Donald Trump and an Epic Tale of Destruction, we find that in 2016 "Trump by now owed the bank about $350 million, representing half of all of his outstanding debt. Deutsche was by far his biggest creditor, and Trump was the single biggest borrower from the private-banking division. To borrow that money, Trump had provided Deutsche with his personal financial guarantees. If he failed to pay the loans back, the bank could come after his personal assets, making his life—and his ability to project the public impression of massive wealth—exceedingly difficult." Those loans are coming due in about two years. Deutsche will probably take Trump to court to get their hands on that $300 million slush fund that Trump raised from his followers to supposedly "Save America."  Trump's golf courses and other properties are losing money because of the pandemic. A few miles south of the namesake tower where Donald Trump began his run for president, New York prosecutors are grinding away at an investigation into his business dealings that could shadow him long after he leaves office. The probe led by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. is one of several legal entanglements likely to intensify when Trump loses power — and immunity from prosecution — upon leaving the White House.

Accountability for the Attempted Coup

by Robert Reich

 

Wednesday, January 13, 2021

Call me old-fashioned, but when the president of the United States encourages armed insurgents to breach the Capitol and threaten the physical safety of Congress, in order to remain in power, I call it an attempted coup.

Last week’ rampage left five dead, including a Capitol Hill police officer who was injured when he tangled with the pro-Trump mob. We’re fortunate the carnage wasn’t greater.

That the attempted coup failed shouldn’t blind us to its significance or the stain it has left on America. Nor to the importance of holding those responsible fully accountable.

Trump’s culpability is beyond dispute. “There’s no question the president formed the mob, the president incited the mob, the president addressed the mob. He lit the flame,” said Rep. Elizabeth Cheney, the third-highest ranking Republican in the House.

He should be impeached, convicted, and removed from office – immediately.  

To let the clock run out on his presidency and allow Trump to seek the presidency again would signal that attempted coups are part of the American system. If Senate Republicans can install a new Supreme Court justice in eight days, Trump can be removed from office within ten.

He should then be arrested and tried for inciting violence and sedition (along with Trump Jr. and Rudy “trial-by-combat” Giuliani).

Those who attacked the Capitol should also be prosecuted. They have no First Amendment right to try to overthrow the U.S. government.

Trump’s accomplices on Capitol Hill, most notably Texas Senator Ted Cruz and Missouri Senator Josh Hawley, should be forced to resign. Knowing Trump’s allegations of voting fraud were false, Cruz and Hawley nonetheless led an attempt to exclude Biden electors, even after the storming of the Capitol.

The United States Constitution says that “no Person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress” who “shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against" the Constitution, “or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.“

Both Cruz and Hawley are eyeing runs for the presidency in 2024. They should be barred from running.

Other abettors are now trying to distance themselves, but their conversions come too late.

Senator Lindsey Graham now says Trump must “understand that his actions were the problem, not the solution,” and criticizes the White House for making “accusations that cannot be proven.”

Graham had been one of Trump’s key attack dogs, even bullying state election officials to change voting tallies. If Graham is not forced to resign, he should at least be censured and stripped of his ranking membership on the Senate Judiciary Committee.  

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Vice President Michael Pence finally broke with Trump, but only after remaining mute as Trump lied and bullied his way through the last eight weeks, thereby signaling agreement with his preposterous claims.

McConnell should also resign or be censured and stripped of committee assignments. Pence should be barred from any future public office.

Some administration officials have already resigned in response to the attempted coup. Transportation secretary Elaine Chao said it was “entirely avoidable,” and education secretary Betsy DeVos told Trump there was “no mistake the impact your rhetoric had.” Other Trumpers are reportedly jumping ship, too.

Yet before Wednesday most of them defended Trump’s antics, lavished him with praise, and willingly did his dirty work. Their complicity should forever haunt their reputations and consciences.

Other accessories are Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, and Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet, YouTube’s parent company.

For four years, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube have functioned as Trump’s megaphones, amplifying his every lie and rant. When pressured to remove Trump’s fabrications about the election, they labeled them “disputed.”  

Twitter has now permanently suspended Trump, preventing him from sending messages to his more than 88 million followers “due to the risk of further incitement for violence.” Facebook has banned him indefinitely. YouTube should be next.

But why did it take an attempted coup for them to act?

Many business leaders who are now denouncing the violence enthusiastically bankrolled Trump’s re-election campaign, knowing full well who he was and what he was capable of doing. And they’ve had no qualms about advertising on his largest megaphones, including Fox News. All are complicit because they knew Trump would stop at nothing.

Fox News’s mendacious hosts and producers have no excuse. After repeatedly telling Trump supporters the election was stolen, they’re now saying the attempted coup was “understandable” because Trump supporters believed the election was stolen. Morally, if not legally, they share responsibility for this travesty.

All are all part of the ecosystem that led to Trump’s sedition. That ecosystem is still in place.

Those who say we should “look forward” to a new administration and forget or dismiss what occurred last week are delusional. Unless all who participated in or abetted the attempted overthrow of the United States government are held accountable, it will happen again. Next time it may succeed.

Off the Top of My Head

Back From the Brink: You Only Get One Bite of the Apple

by John Lawrence, January13, 2021

Two things stand out: 1) how little bloodshed there was compared to the potential; 2) how much the rioters incriminated themselves. And they will pay the price for their little escapade. The extremest extremists will go to jail for a long time. They have already identified hundreds of them from the voluminous video evidence as they paraded themselves in front of tons of cameras. Stealth was not their strong suit. This was probably the most inept coup attempt in history, THANK GOD! The "USA. USA" people lost their bid to cause a revolution in the name of Trump and Congress won. Trump was the biggest loser. LOSER. LOSER. Trump, don't let the White House door bang you in the ass on the way out. Now even Republicans are up in arms so to speak because what Trump has really done is to destroy the Republican party. It will never be the same again. It might even bifurcate or disintegrate.

Trump will be silenced, neutered, taken off social media, disgraced, prosecuted and more. He brought disgrace to the USA long before he was impeached for the second time by withdrawing from and insulting our allies, refusing to cooperate with other nations of good will, cozying up to dictators and bullying those nations he decided he needed to use as enemies. Now the Republican rats are leaving the sinking Trump ship. They realize that he has destroyed the Republican party, but the Republican party has also destroyed itself long before Trump became President. They made a deal with the devil by embracing white supremicists because they needed a base, and the upper 1% wasn't big enough in terms of numbers. They went shopping for a base and they found latter day Ku Klux Klan descendents. Their grandpappies said, "Segregation Now. Segregation Tomorrah. Segragation Fawevah!" Later generations learned their lessons well, and thy found a home in the Republican party.

Proud Boys stand up and sit down. How does 20 years in an orange jump suit sound to you? This situation, as horrible as it was, as a spectacle and a possible disaster for Congress persons, staff, janitors, family members and others inside the Capitol building is also characterized by the gargantuan ineptness of the people who attempted to take it over. In the final analysis they did little more than incriminate themselves and put these domestic terrorists on the FBI's shit list. DOJ and the National Guard are on high alert. Now lawmakers in Michigan and elsewhere need to roll back the open carry laws. It's unconscionable that these assholes are currently able to bring their AR-15s into state Capitols. If you don't want an armed revolution in this country, guns need to be taken out of the hands of these domestic terrorists and white supremacists. Despite the Second Amendment, felons are forbidden to buy or own guns. That should be the fate of all the gun loving folks who invaded the Capitol of the US. No guns, boys. Sorry. your toys are being taken away from you. Maybe you can find Jesus in the penitentiary and change your thought processes. They need to be reprogrammed. Maybe they will even make friends with a black person when they find themselves in similar situations as they serve 20 years to life ... together! How ironic. Those who chanted "Lock her up" are themselves going to be locked up for many years.

The South's attempt at a second Civil War has failed abysmally. The nation's military assets are on high alert. Domestic terrorists will be on the no-fly list. They'll end up on the no everything list or in other words the shit list. Their favorite social media sites for conspiring together have been and will be taken away from them. Advertisers are withdrawing their funding for right wing media outlets. Threatening phone calls will be traced, and those jackasses will be thrown in jail. Meanwhile, the rest of the country will get to work with a massive bailout, defeating the real enemy - COVID - and putting people to work at good paying jobs building green infrastructure. Life will eventually be good again. Then we can deal with the real threats facing us - global warming, poverty and pandemics, not only in the US but everywhere on earth because in the final analysis we really are all in this together.

The FBI or Congress Should Be Considering FREEZING Trump’s $250 Million in Donations He Could Use Privately

by Frank Thomas

In these times of rampaging riot and death threats by the conservative right radicals, it is understandably quite inopportune to consider a serious question that comes to mind – but question that at least should be raised now.

The simple question is: Is it possible – given Trump’s contribution to the horrendous riot, deaths and destruction emanating from the insurrection attack on our nation’s Capital – to FREEZE the massive donations amounting to $250 million received by Trump recently and rising on every day now! It’s possible he cleverly conned or misled donors for these monies.

Experts say Trump can use the millions donated for personal costs. But, he has created multi-millions of costs for the U.S. government, ^i.e. taxpayers, in his dominant role of inciting the mad mob storming of thousands of Republicans into the D.C. Capital building – the symbolic citadel of our democracy.

Shouldn’t the donated $millions go against the giganticmillions of U.S. government (taxpayer) costs stemming from his actions? I have not heard yet any raising of this idea on CNN or other media. This is because all attention is rightly being directed to holding Trump accountable through impeachment. Greatly speeding up vaccinations, substantially increasing the aid to people and small enterprises, and sharply increasing jobs. I think this can be done while working on the impeachment process, or postponing it, or taking some other strong joint action against Trump.

The urgent need is to prevent this mentally deranged man from ever running again for the presidential office and from his setting a precedent he did no criminal or constitutional wrong … which future insurrectionists can exploit.

Frank Thomas, The Netherlands, January 12, 2021

Off the Top of My Head

Instead of Sanctioning Foreign Actors Sanction Domestic Terrorists

by John Lawrence, January 12, 2021

The best development so far post insurrection is taking away Trump's twitter account permanently. The FBI, CIA and other law enforcement are rounding up the insurrectionists and they should get lengthy jail sentences and sanctions. The biggest threat to American democracy is not out there; it's in here. Their gathering places on social media such as Parler have been taken down or will be taken down soon. If the terrorists can't meet to spout their vitriol as well as plan future insurrections, we'll be making progress. Rush Limbaugh and other domestic terrorists should be sanctioned. Anyone egging on, benefiting from, taking advantage of the poor mental health or encouraging hatred and violence of the American people needs to be sanctioned. The fact that these terrorists could overwhelm the Capitol Police was a huge security failure. The fact that it took the Pentagon three hours to supply troops shows the fact that we are wasting huge amounts of money on a worthless military establishment that does not confront the real threats to this country. Perhaps these domestic terrorists need to be reeducated. We don't have the moral authority to mock China any more for doing this with its domestic terrorists.

Right now security forces in the US are on high alert. The National Guard is out in force. There are more forces on the streets of Washington, DC now than there are in Afghanistan. They should stay on high alert for the time being. I think the situation will get under control. Massive arrests and the total deplatforming and isolation of Donald Trump and domestic terrorist social media sites needs to be carried out. If they don't have gathering places on social media, they won't be able to organize. That's important. There needs to be a recognition that the militarization of the mindsets of young Americans which happens in the military and the glorification and seeming ubiquity of war as the only way to deal with other nations is a cause of the recent problems. Instead of funneling all non-college bound youth into the military, there needs to be an upsurge in funding and encouragement for young people to go into the Peace Corps and AmeriCorps. We need to demilitarize the mindsets of the American people.

Terrorist and threatening phone calls need to be traced and the perpetrators brought to justice. No public official should have to live in fear for their lives and their family's lives because of death threats on phone calls or on social media. Social media is a big problem. They have gotten rich off the fact that their algorithms have encouraged, aided and abetted the domestic terrorists. Their business model showed that there was a lot of profit in encouraging conspiracy theories and other activities detached from reality. It's good that it has become evident by reporting on legitimate news outlets that social media is not subject to the First Amendment because that only applies to government hindrance of free speech. Social media platforms are private entities and they do not have to honor so-called free speech. Private entities also don't have to honor the Second Amendment so that there is space to restrict guns on private property which is probably 99% of the property in the US.

The next administration has its work cut out for them. Good leaders and good people will prevail. Deplatforming all right wing media and groups that espouse conspiracy theories and outright lies will be an important step. Sober analysis and critical thinking must replace narcissistic fantasy and entertainment values. This starts with children in school. They need to taught how to distinguish truth from lies. They need to be taught the value of peace and harmony not only in their daily lives but in the pursuit of that status among and between nations. They should be taught that the US has not always been but should aspire to moral and ethical behavior with regard to other nations and within its own country.

Money must be drained from the military establishment which is oriented towards either non-existant or phony threats and reoriented towards the real threats and funded at appropriate levels rather than be treated to carte blanche amounts of superfluous cash. Budgets both military and domestic need to be appropriate to their realistic needs. Right now the greatest need is in overcoming the pandemic and responding to the economic needs of the lower half of the population. Also eliminating energy production from fossil fuels needs to proceed post haste. It's obvious that the private economy can not do this at the rate necessary to save the planet from the ravages of global warming. Only big government programs in conjunction with the programs of other countries can possibly achieve the reality of zero carbon emissions by 2030.

The last word is that Trump must be denied any post Presidential influence or following by any and all legal means. This is the greatest thing that can be done to heal and deradicalize the country. America also will pay a heavy price if it doesn't get its promotion of gun culture under control.

Fools Rush In: Trump, Pardons and the Tyrant’s Cult

January 11, 2021 from Counterpunch

by Joshua Frank

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Trump insurrectionists laying siege to the Capitol building – January 6, 2021. (Tyler Merbler, CC BY 2.0)

There is little doubt among readers of this online magazine that Donald Trump, like all U.S. presidents before him, is a criminal. His grotesqueness and belligerence, however, has elevated Trump to Nixonian heights. With Bugsy Siegel’s mob swagger and the ponzi-salesmanship of Bernie Madoff, Trump, the petty grifter, is unlike almost any official we’ve witnessed in public life.

In his 1979 book, the Culture of Narcissism: American Life in an Age of Diminishing Expectations, social critic and historian Christopher Lasch all but predicted the dawn of Trumpian politics, writing:

“…the prevailing obsession with celebrity and a determination to achieve it even at the cost of rational self-interest and personal safety. The narcissist divides society into two groups: the rich, great, and famous on the one hand, and the common herd on the other … The narcissist admires and identifies himself with ‘winners’ out of his fear of being labeled a loser. … his admiration often turns to hatred if the object of his attachment does something to remind him of his own insignificance.”

The only point that Lasch perhaps missed in his pioneering work is the cultish atmosphere a specimen like Donald Trump is able to cultivate and exploit for his own personal and political gains. It’s this innate narcissism, emboldened by a coterie of abiding fools circling round him, that led to the invasion of the Capitol. His racist minions, not too unlike the conditioned and dutiful helter-skeltering Manson Girls, were more than willing to sacrifice their personal safety for what they believed was the greater good — in this case, a battle against the “injustice” Trump had faced at the hands of some mysterious electoral fraud. The sinister enemies were everywhere. The media. Mitch McConnell. Nancy Pelosi. The Georgia Secretary of State and even that smarmy Mike Pence. The lone truth-teller was Trump, the great defender of the supremacy of white America, and to his energetic fans, the only man able to save our fragile and dying Republic from the brink of collapse.

Understanding Trump as a cult leader is the only way to truly appreciate the power he wields and the idiocy he manifests. Few others could call upon their legions to storm government buildings with the dashing hope their efforts would make a difference, overturning what they falsely believed was a rigged election. No longer did police lives matter to these twisted Patriots. No longer did America’s legal system matter, which shot down one election lawsuit after another. No longer did common sense matter, if the Capitol stormers had any to begin with. Only their President mattered. Only fulfilling his delusional fantasies mattered, and this was worth risking imprisonment and even death for. While the refrain may have been “Make America Great Again”, the real mantra echoing through Washington last Wednesday was “Keep Trump President.” He had not, after all, lost, according to them. The multiple logics here were murky at best, but the essence of their rhetoric was not.

As an ice-cold Trump stood at his podium, cold air blowing against his puffy, orange cheeks, he bellowed nonsense to the assemblage below, which was largely made up of white men and women clasping red Trump flags and banners. Like so many of his election trail spectacles, his speech was long-winded, meandering, and bellicose. The crowd screamed “Fight for Trump! Fight for Trump! Fight for Trump!” At the end, he called on the riled-up crowd to parade with him to the Capitol building where Congress was meeting to certify Biden’s electoral victory. They would finally be heard. There would finally be justice.

“…we fight like hell, and if you don’t fight like hell you’re not going to have a country anymore … So we are going to–we are going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue, I love Pennsylvania Avenue, and we are going to the Capitol, and we are going to try and give–the Democrats are hopeless, they are never voting for anything, not even one vote but we are going to try–give our Republicans, the weak ones because the strong ones don’t need any of our help, we’re try–going to try and give them the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country. So let’s walk down Pennsylvania Avenue.”

We all know what transpired next. The broken windows. The stolen podium. The “QAnon Shaman” with his horns and fur hat. A self-proclaimed white nationalist kicking back at Pelosi’s desk. The woman, shot and killed by police as her fellow rioters violently attempted to break down a barricaded door. One cop was killed. It was chaos as numerous fascist groups converged for action. Trump, of course, did not march with his cult down Pennsylvania Avenue that afternoon. He never planned to. Instead, he stayed back, stoically watching the scene unfold on television screens safely under a white tent as Laura Branigan’s “Gloria” blared in the background. Everyone was packed in, smiling. Dancing. Celebrating. Maskless. Drunk on Trump madness.

Had the rioters had black or brown skin, armed or not, they would surely have been shot on the spot as they climbed walls and ransacked the congressional building. Instead, a few of Trump’s intruders were greeted by gleeful officers while hordes of off-duty cops hung out in the crowd. The breach was easy for the mob, as security forces holding the line futilely fired pepper spray. Their efforts failed miserably. They were outnumbered and ill-prepared. Why weren’t they ready for what so many knew was coming? Because these were wholesome white goons and not black rights activists? During last summer’s BLM protests in DC, there were far more stormtroopers present, an overwhelming show of force. The lack of police presence on January 9 appeared intentional.

As more photos are corroborated and verified, it’s becoming evident that a group of these fascist thugs, some with military backgrounds, had something even more sinister planned than smearing their feces on the walls of power. They planted pipe bombs and had a truck full of weapons at the ready. One instigator, as Ronan Farrow reported for The New Yorker, decked in full military garb and a handful of zip ties, was Air Force Academy graduate and retired Lt. Colonel. Ret. Larry Brock, a decorated combat veteran from Texas. He and his fellow Confederate flag-waving terrorists were out for blood. As the raid transpired, Trump, the pseudo-conductor, gleefully responded that he “loved” them and that they were “very special” but they could go home now. The National Guard, after Trump initially resisted, was finally called in. As of this writing, only 82 have been arrested for breaking into the Capitol. By comparison, DC cops arrested five times that number during last summer’s BLM protests.

There is little doubt, legal or otherwise, that Trump fomented this haphazard insurrection. While some of the planning was orchestrated in the darker corners of the web, Trump’s Twitter account acted as ground zero for the disorder. After months of claiming, falsely and without evidence, that the election was stolen, he tweeted on December 19, “Big protest in D.C. on January 6th.” This was one of several tweets he blasted out supporting the action. “Be there, will be wild!”

His cult, from the Proud Boys to QAnon, latched on quickly, and Pro-Trump forums across the web were exuberant about their “daddy’s” call (yes, some called him “daddy”) for an uprising against Congress. It was all out in the open. They were planning to be armed. They were planning to “arrest” members of Congress. They said Trump’s Tweet was a “marching order” and prepared themselves to shoot counter-protestors.

While the FBI ignored the threats, Twitter and other social media giants took note. Following the three-hour takeover, Facebook and Instagram blocked Trump. Twitter placed his account in jail for 12 hours, only to later ban him altogether. By the weekend, Twitter began to scrub those they deemed QAnon or promoters and supporters of Trump’s call for insurrection. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, an advocacy group that works to defend civil liberties in the digital world, was swift to respond:

“The decisions by Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and others to suspend and/or block President Trump’s communications via their platforms is a simple exercise of their rights, under the First Amendment and Section 230, to curate their sites. We support those rights. Nevertheless, we are always concerned when platforms take on the role of censors, which is why we continue to call on them to apply a human rights framework to those decisions.”

This social media blockade is the first real punishment Trump has faced for his actions since the failed impeachment attempt of last year. Could he receive more? The 25th Amendment is not going to be invoked and impeachment proceedings are facing hurdles. Once Trump vacates the White House he may be facing numerous charges in New York for financial crimes and even election finance fraud for his various payments to Stormy Daniels. But will he ever be brought to justice for inciting this ugly white nationalist riot? It’s possible. The New York Times reports the DOJ is open to pursuing charges. Others believe the charges could stick. “Based on everything I saw my 30 years as a federal prosecutor, it sure looks like there’s enough to charge him with inciting a riot,” says former Assistant U.S. Attorney Glenn Kirschner.

Of course, any criminal case against Trump would not transpire until he leaves office on January 20. But what of a self-pardon? There’s plenty of talk of Trump not only pardoning those around him who have yet to be accused of a crime (Ivanka, Rudy, Jared, etc.) but of pardoning himself as well. Such a pardon, however, may or may not hold up in court. In a 1974 opinion by the Dept. of Justice, written in response to Nixon’s dealings with Watergate and the potential for his own self-pardon, the DOJ responded that, “Under the fundamental rule that no one may be a judge in his own case, the President cannot pardon himself.”

For such a self-pardon to be litigated, Trump would first have to be charged. Such an indictment is no guarantee but still possible. On Friday, a DC City official, who was not authorized to speak on the matter, told me the City was discussing a charge against Trump for the mob disorder. On Sunday it was confirmed by Washington DC District Attorney, Michael R. Sherwin, who said he will be going after all those involved, including any elected officials. However, any prosecution in DC falls under federal jurisdiction. So any pardon challenge would go into effect and likely make its way to the Supreme Court, where Trump-leaning appointees now stack the bench.

Though it may be only a matter of days, we have a long road to traverse before we reach the end of this four-year-long dumpster fire. Already, scores of Trump’s acolytes are planning a violent confrontation on Inauguration Day and these fascists are more armed and crazier than ever. As Trump, the pathological narcissist that he is, finally loses grip on power, his significance will wane and breed further resentment in this sick and sinister faction of white America, energized by their vile settler mentality that has existed since these lands were first stolen from indigenous nations. It may take years before this latest chapter of our country’s history finally comes to a close, if it ever shuts completely. In the interim, there will be more sporadic madness and more bloodshed, until the day the Trump cult, outnumbered and on the ropes, has nothing tangible to fight for, no leader, no mythical wrong that can be righted. Hopefully, Trump’s white nationalist goons will be left with only a faint memory of their childish insurgency, shining dully like the fool’s gold they’ve been sold.

---

JOSHUA FRANK is managing editor of CounterPunch. His most recent book, co-authored with Jeffrey St. Clair, is Big Heat: Earth on the Brink. He can be reached at [email protected]. You can troll him on Twitter @joshua__frank.

Off the Top of My Head

Pence Will Likely Not Pardon Trump Even If He Resigns

by John Lawrence, January 11, 2021

When Richard Nixon resigned his Presidency in 1974, his successor, Gerald Ford pardoned him for any and all crimes connected with the Watergate break-in. But this will not happen in Trump's case because he threw Pence under the bus in the January 6 insurrection. Trump has immense criminal and legal liability for his actions on that day. As Pence presided over the Senate, domestic terrorists were breaking in and chanting "Hang Mike Pence." Pence's life as well as those of Congress persons, staff and others were in danger. Pence's wife, daughter and other family members were in the Capitol that day. Yet Trump never called Pence to warn him, check on him, see how he was doing, make sure he and his family were safe. Reportedly, he hasn't spoken to Pence since.

So it remains to be seen how many people Trump will pardon on his way out the door. Probably family members and Rudy Giuliani but not any of the rioters. Even though they were doing his bidding, he cares nothing for them. He used them; they were just tools as far as he was concerned. The people who spoke at Trump's "Save America" rally, including Congressman Mo Brooks of Alabama who declared: “Today is the day American patriots start taking down names and kicking ass", are certainly culpable. But I don't think Trump will pardon him. He'll just be thrown under the bus like many of Trump's other friends and associates.

The people marching through the halls of Congress carrying flags and chanting "USA. USA." are not patriots. To be a patriot it is not enough to carry a flag and shout USA. The true patriots were the Congress persons themselves who didn't let a little insurrection that put their lives in danger prevent or deter them from carrying out the nation's business certifying Joe Biden and Kamala Harris as the next President and Vice President of the United States. I wrote previously, "What is patriotism? Is it just saluting the flag, singing the national anthem, getting choked up when the US wins a gold medal at the Olympics, stuff like that? All these expressions of patriotism are merely lip service. They are insubstantial. Or is it patriotic, as George W Bush said, to go shopping?"  I have suggested that what we need is a planetary patriotism. We must care about the whole planet and its peoples especially in view of the threats which affect the whole planet: pandemics and global warming. We need also to be concerned about people living in poverty planet wide, and about the 70 million people who are refugees largely due to US started wars in the Middle East and their continuations.

The US has lost the moral high ground and shouldn't be lecturing the rest of the world about human rights. The US has many human rights problems itself including the disenfranchisement of African American and Native Americans both politically and economically. I expect that the Biden administration will do much more to create peace in the world and use diplomacy than the Trump administration, which attempted to bully other countries. Sanctions also should be taken off the table. If we can have treaties with Russia over nuclear weapons, why can't we have a treaty over internet hacking? The  trillion dollars a year we spend on the military-industrial complex did nothing to stop the pandemic or domestic terrorism. The enemy is not so much out there as it is in here. The US needs to get on the right track and associate peacefully with other countries in order to combat our mutual enemy - global warming. We need to create peace in the world, not fuel petty animosities and cold wars. The true threat is domestic terrorism not terrorism from abroad. Money needs to be spent on the former rather than the latter.

I wrote previously:

Patriotism as now defined is based on militarism. Patriotic displays are expressions of militarism. Love of country is expressed in jingoistic terms: "We're number one!" Instead, war and militarism should be thought of as necessary evils instead of exalting them. The goal should be to eliminate them while at the same time building the foundations for peace and prosperity in the world. There should be opportunities for those who want to serve their country by eliminating poverty, building infrastructure, saving the environment, curing the sick and extending helping hands to the underserved and downtrodden."

"God bless America."

Off the Top of My Head

Congressional Republicans That Supported Insurrection Should Be Censured

by John Lawrence, January 10, 2021

Although it takes a two thirds majority to expel someone from the House or Senate, it only takes a majority to censure. Therefore, Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley and Kevin McCarthy at the very least should be censured. They will lose their committee chairs and be publicly shamed because the politician must stand before his peers to listen to the censure resolution. Meanwhile, Trump should be impeached in the House, but there should be no trial in the Senate because that would be a media circus of which Trump would be the star, and this would steal Joe Biden's thunder just as he assumes the office of President of the United States. The page needs to be turned and Trump should be blacklisted from every form of media exposure. Twitter, Facebook and others have already banned him for life which is the best thing that could have happened. Right wing app Parler has been deplatformed. Rudy Giuliani and Don Junior need to be prosecuted for inciting to riot for the words they spoke at Trump's Save America rally that preceded the insurrection. "Trial by combat"? Indeed. Long story short, Trump should be denied any media exposure whatsoever. The focus should be on Joe Biden's Presidency and the reckonings of those that have committed prosecutorial crimes needs to be done offstage, so to speak.

We need a breath of fresh air come January 20 while in the background those who have committed crimes connected with the insurrection need to be brought to justice. Every one of the rioters need to serve jail time or be fined - even those who crossed the barriers but did not go inside the Capitol. Those who went inside the Capitol need to be dealt more severe penalties. None of these rioters should be left off the hook. The myth that these assholes are Patriots needs to be dispelled. The only ones who are innocent in my opinion are those who didn't cross the line that the barriers represented. I'm sure that over time they all will be penalized in one form or other because there is so much video and social media evidence including their own bragging on social media. The FBI has their work cut out for them. In the meantime security needs to be ramped up at state Capitals all across the country, and gun laws need to be augmented and strengthened. Probably the only thing that saved the Capitol from an armed insurrection was the fact that so many of them flew to Trump's event and weren't allowed to bring guns on the plane. You can't have people with machine guns threatening state Capitals or office holders of a party they disagree with. We've seen too much of that already. Security around Joe Biden and Kamala Harris needs to be extremely tight. We don't want what happened to Abraham Lincoln happening to either of them.

At the same time Joe Biden and his Democratic allies in Congress have to get a humungus aid package passed and into the hands of the American people - all of them - so that there are tangible benefits for all to see and benefit from including Trump, hopefully former, supporters. The coronavirus must be brought under control. The ineffective US intelligence agencies have a budget of about $75 billion and yet they had no intelligence relating to what an average American could plainly size up: a Trump rally attracting tens of thousands on the same day that Congress certified the election results. I wrote previously how like James Bond's arch villains, Trump would show up January 6 for one last stand even when we all thought the election was finally, after repeated certifications at multiple levels, over. Bond's villains do not give up and neither did Trump after he had tried every other trick in the book to overturn the election. I'm sure he had plans for the inauguration on January 20 as well. That's why security at the inauguration needs to be extremely tight.

Social media by and large has finally done the right thing banning Trump and right wing wack jobs and conspiracy theorists. But it is obviously too late. They should have done this long ago. There are much needed reforms that need to be undertaken regarding social media. They have in fact aided and abetted the worst impulses of American society as their algorithms favored conspiracy theories and other fantastic falsehoods as they brought more eyeballs to the platforms than did the plain unvarnished truth. We have to reckon with a model in the media that is basically centered on entertainment including the news. Bringing eyeballs to the media - all media - is what advertising is all about. Advertisers won't pay and media corporations won't make any money from sober analysis because it's not entertaining enough and people demand to be entertained. Although Trump's lies are being finally called out all over the media, let us not forget that lies perpetrated via the media are nothing new. The Willie Horton ads promulgated for George H W Bush's 1988 Presidential campaign typify the lying that political candidates have always partaken of with Trump just being the latest purveyor.

"Horton, an African-American man, was a convicted murderer who raped a white woman and stabbed her partner while furloughed from prison under a Massachusetts program in place when Dukakis, the Democratic nominee, was governor. The TV ad is now considered one of the most racially divisive in modern political history because it played into white fear and African-American stereotypes. In it, an off-screen narrator tells the story of Horton’s crimes while pictures of Bush and Dukakis and a menacing mug shot of Horton flash across the screen. The narrator notes that Bush supports the death penalty for murderers."

Clearly, there should be thought given to bringing about truth in media and what can be done to insure that the American people aren't sold a pack of lies by politicians or in any other kind of advertising. American culture has also been brutalized and vulgarized because this has been shown by advertisers to attract the most eyeballs. Violence in media runs rampant. It's almost like you have to watch movies from Europe to see something which doesn't contain violence and usually gun violence of the most graphic sort which pervades US entertainment. This is the stuff that media corporations produce because they think it's the most lucrative. Politicians supported Trump's lies because they thought it was the best way to get elected or reelected. Other societies have not put up with this crap. Violence and lies, although they may be entertaining, need to be restrained if America is ever to attain some degree of collective mental health. I for one will send up a cheer for sober analysis.

Big Tech Further Mutes President, Far Right Megaphone as Demands for Trump Removal Swell

Published on

Saturday, January 09, 2021

by Common Dreams

Google yanked Parler from its app store Friday in light of "continued posting... that seeks to incite ongoing violence in the U.S."

by Andrea Germanos, staff writer

 

24 Comments

Donald Trump's Twitter account displayed on a mobile phone screen next to a vinyl doll which features the U.S. President Donald Trump, seen in front of the U.S. flag, on Saturday, 9 January 2021, in Dublin, Ireland. (Photo: Artur Widak/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Amid ongoing calls for President Donald Trump to face accountability for his role in encouraging Wednesday's attack on the U.S. Capitol, Google announced Friday that it pulled from its app store Parler—a social media platform described as "where the rancor of the far-right thrives"—citing "continued posting... that seeks to incite ongoing violence in the U.S."

"In order to protect user safety on Google Play, our longstanding policies require that apps displaying user-generated content have moderation policies and enforcement that removes egregious content like posts that incite violence," a Google spokesperson said. "All developers agree to these terms and we have reminded Parler of this clear policy in recent months."

"We're aware of continued posting in the Parler app that seeks to incite ongoing violence in the U.S.," the statement continued. "In light of this ongoing and urgent public safety threat, we are suspending the app's listings from the Play Store until it addresses these issues."

Arusha Gordon, associate director of the James Byrd Jr. Center to Stop Hate at the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, welcomed the development. "It is time companies enforce their terms of use and ensure their products are not used by white supremacists and others to organize violent attacks on our democracy," she said.

Google's announcement followed Apple's threat earlier on Friday to ban Parler within 24 hours unless the social media app submitted an updated plan for moderating its content amid accusations Parler was a key medium for facilitating Wednesday's failed coup effort. 

"We have received numerous complaints regarding objectionable content in your Parler service, accusations that the Parler app was used to plan, coordinate, and facilitate the illegal activities in Washington D.C. on January 6, 2021 that led (among other things) to loss of life, numerous injuries, and the destruction of property," Apple wrote to Parler, according to BuzzFeed News. "The app also appears to continue to be used to plan and facilitate yet further illegal and dangerous activities."

The developments came the same day Twitter suspended Trump's personal account, @realdonaldtrump. The ban followed Trump firing off over 57,000 tweets, frequently using the platform throughout his time in office to spread xenophobia, throw insults, and amplify false claims of voter fraud, which prompted Twitter warnings on the posts starting in May. 

@TeamTrump was subsequently suspended on Friday after that account posted a series of tweets attributed to the president, since "using another account to try to evade a suspension is against our rules," Twitter said. 

Just ahead of that account's suspension, it "had pointed its 2.3 million followers to its account on Parler," Reuters reported.

 

The swelling list of suspended Trump-affiliated accounts includes Facebook, with that company blocking the president from posting on his account for at least two weeks. "We believe the risks of allowing the president to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great," said CEO Mark Zuckerberg. 

Digital rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation says the companies are justified in the bans, calling the moves "a simple exercise of [the platforms'] rights, under the First Amendment and Section 230, to curate their sites."

"Nevertheless," EFF legal director Corynne McSherry wrote Thursday, "we are always concerned when platforms take on the role of censors, which is why we continue to call on them to apply a human rights framework to those decisions." She urged the platforms to be "more transparent and consistent in how they apply their rules—and we call on policymakers to find ways to foster competition so that users have numerous editorial options and policies from which to choose."

EFF's call came as questions swirled about how the extremist mob was able to wreak the havoc they did, especially given indications the violence would unfold. As ProPublica reported Thursday, "warnings of Wednesday's assault on the Capitol were everywhere" on social media, including Parler.

Detailing those warnings, far-right extremism researcher Alex Newhouse wrote Friday at The Conversation:

Although posts on Facebook and Twitter hinted that more than just protests were possible, nowhere was the coming violence as obvious as on Parler. The site, which has attracted millions of new conservative users in the past year, has positioned itself as a bastion for right-wing conspiracy theories and organizing efforts. From my research, hundreds of Parler users expressed their sincere belief, and even desire, that the demonstrations would spark a physical battle, revolution or civil war.

We are ready to fight back and we want blood," a Parler post from Dec. 28 declared. "The president need to do some thing if Jan. 6 is the day then we are ready." Another user stated, "January 6 will either be our saving grace or we will have another civil war that should end very quickly!! Either way Trump will be our POTUS!! Anything less is unacceptable!!"

Using tools that allow me to monitor large-scale social media data, I found evidence that right-wing activists had been explicit and open with their intentions for the Jan. 6 demonstrations since at least mid-December.

The heightened scrutiny of Parler joins growing calls for Trump's removal, either through impeachment or the 25th Amendment, with the demands coming from advocacy groups as well as a growing list of lawmakers.

A group of House Democrats plans on introducing an article of impeachment against Trump on Monday for "willfully inciting violence against the government of the United States."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says the House will act on the measure next week of the president doesn't resign first.

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Off the Top of My Head

My Horse, My Horse, My Kingdom for a Horse

by John Lawrence, January 9, 2021

Only in Trump's case: My Twitter Account, My Twitter Account, My Kingdom for a Twitter Account. Trump has been emasculated. He's been banned from Twitter, Facebook, Shopify and God knows what else. As well he should be. This guy was not so much a President as he was a Tweeter-in-Chief and rabble rouser. He roused a lot of rabble a few days ago when he almost had Congress persons killed and taken hostage. Who thought it was a good idea to have a rally on the day the votes for the next President were to be certified? Well, Donald Trump of course. He knew what he was doing. It's just that his doofus supporters were inept at coup planning or the outcome might have been entirely different. Trump, Rudy Giuliani ("trial by combat"? he was wrong and, according to his own words, has been made a fool of and should go to jail) and Don Jr should be criminally implicated for inspiring to riot. Trump should be criminally implicated also for not calling out the National Guard till it might have been too late. It seems that only he had the authority to do so, and he was allowing sufficient time for his acolytes to do their dirty work.

Joe Biden definitely has his work cut out for him. He has to deal with a global pandemic which may be mutating. He has to deal with 40 years of neoliberal economic policies which have made the rich richer and the poor homeless. And he has to deal with a cult of domestic terrorists. To those who think that China, Russia and Iran are the problems, I've got news for you: the American people, a huge contingent of them, are the problem. Gun violence is the problem. Trillions of dollars wasted on a sitting military, on the grounds that we have enemies who justify this, is the problem. The policies of George W Bush who caused millions of deaths in the Middle East with the result of ongoing chaos is the problem. It's enough to make your head spin. While the US is in chaos as a society, the rest of the world is moving forward. While Joe Biden must play catch up, the rest of the world is moving ahead. While much of the US citizenry is composed of cultish dingbats, the rest of the world are very clear eyed by comparison. While the US culture and militarization of mindset is descending into a cesspool of self indulgence, people in the rest of the world are using their brains and feelings of compassion for their fellow inhabitants of earth to move ahead. While religious bigots use Jesus as an excuse to do dastardly deeds in the same way that the Ku Klux Klan has always done, the rest of the world is coming from a more enlightened attitude toward ethics and morality, religion or no religion.

The result is that the US has become the equivalent of a Third World country with an outsized and bloated military. Pride goeth before a fall, and the US, if it cannot get its act together, will go the way of the Roman Empire when it descended into chaos. The best the US can hope for coming out of the putrefaction of the Trump era is to be a good partner with the rest of the world as we solve enormous problems including climate change and poverty. No more yelling "We're Number One" when clearly a significant number of us are spoiled brats and worse. Let's turn the military culture into a peace culture. Let's take megaphones away from demagogues the way Twitter has denied Trump his Twitter account. Let's police social media.

Social media has not ennobled the American people; instead it has allowed a large number of Americans to be turned into a cult the way radio allowed Hitler in the 1930s to encultify, to coin a word, the German people. Cults demand that people pay obeisance to a leader. Kim Jong Un is sitting there thinking that the US is just as big a cult as North Korea. The remedy for this is that people have to be educated to think critically and not to follow some powerful figure with a huge megaphone whether it be Hitler, Mussolini or Donald Trump. Trump's megaphone has been taken away the way a parent takes away a child's favorite toy if he or she misbehaves. Trump's following have a militarized mindset. I would lay dollars to doughnuts that most of them have served in the military the way Ashli Babbit, the rioter who was shot, did. Perhaps if young Americans were required to do two years of national service or service in the Peace Corps instead of being incentivized to become Marines, sailors and airmen, attitudes would change. Instead of their minds being molded to taking commands from superior officers, they might develop an alternative mindset in which serving the poor and unfortunate of the world would be their highest priority.

The US has become a degenerate society, composed of unthinking followers of a strongman who had promised them that they're number one, Americans are number one and we're the greatest society and nation on earth. This is misguided thinking doomed to failure. This is the fall of the Roman Empire, the people of which had become a bunch of degenerate spoiled brats. There are good people here of course. The new administration represents a great many of them. There are many changes that need to be made in US society that they will try to change. It will be a sisyphean effort. Much of what has been seen as essential to American culture will have to be discarded and we will have to join the rest of the world's nations humbly in a cooperative effort to combat global warming and create a culture of love, peace and compassion.