David Brooks, flat out wrong on recommendation to bar Trump from office.

Usually, when David Brooks says anything on his Friday night appearance on the PBS Newshour I take it with a mine of salt, and move on. Last night he came out against the January 6th Commission's recommendation that Trump be barred from future office. The jist of it was, "We have a way to bar office holders, with the vote". I read the report. Trump has proven that he won't let "the vote" stop him. No "politician" with such disregard for the results of elections should be allowed to participate in one. Trump would attempt to turn his next presidency into a lifetime appointment by and for himself. Hitler never ran a reelection campaign for dictator. That is what we are up against.

The part about these comments is toward the end of the video.

Random assortment of things NOT being said by republicans about call to terminate Constitution.

"I will do anything in my power to prevent him from being the nominee for my party."

"If he is the republican nominee, I will actively campaign against him."

"Anyone who supports him after this is not welcome in our party."

"Someone who says something like this can never be allowed near the levers of power again."

Summary of things we ARE hearing:
"Homina homina homina"

A little sprout of hope takes root.

The 2016 election surprised the professionals who did not think that Trump would be nominated, much less elected. What happened? Trump personified the perfect candidate for right wing radio and TV consumers who only had tepid support for McCain and Romney. He tapped into previously disaffected voters who came out of the woodworks. What gives me that little bit of hope is that last night's election makes it appear that the woodworks have been emptied out.

I have zero hope that any individual Trump voter could be converted, but I do have hope that they can simply be outnumbered. A mid-term election during a time of inflation (whether it's the president's fault or not) should have been a more obvious drubbing for the incumbent's party. The fact that it wasn't gives me a little hope for the future.

Just finished watching the rebroadcast of Freedom Summer on PBS

I was born in New Orleans at the end of 1964, so I was in the womb during these events happening a short distance away. As I gained awareness of race and race relations in the early 70's, I received a different education on the subject than other whites from the 60's and before. The two main reasons for this were that my parents never did buy into the prevailing white supremacy of the south, and secondly that the freshly earned achievements of the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act gave me the sense that I was born into a new world finally free from the long icy shadow of slavery and jim crow. It did not take long to realize that I was naive, but it took longer to realize that I was still naive and why.

However insidious you think racism is, double it. It no longer needs to actively create economic disparity, educational inequality and segregated communities, it has these already built in from centuries past and simply has to use these conditions as a base of operations to halt further change and reverse it where it can. This reversal which I never thought I would see is beginning to take shape in the form of voting restrictions. These restrictions are not the direct brutal kind seen in Mississippi in the 60's. They take a more devious form, one that seeks to reduce the black vote by creating a bottle neck on the times and number of places where voting occurs for black voters and white voters who would vote beside them for the same candidates. A few technical hurdles like voter ID and citations for giving slices of pizza to voters in line are thrown in for good measure. They are not taking your vote away, they are attempting to create the conditions whereupon you take your own vote away to avoid inconvenience.

If that was the only problem, it could be overcome with numbers, but a more sinister issue is the machinations to control the counting of the votes giving rise to the once unthinkable scenario of the will of the people being overturned in legislatures. This might still be in the pipe dream stage but be wary.

What gives rise to all this bullshit? Abolitionist newspaper offices were burned, a war was fought to keep slavery and the descendants of slaves were terrorized for a century and more after that: why does racism have such staying power and viciousness? I think that for too many, equality is a concept that does not compute. Race is zero sum, "we're over them or they're over us". This is passed down to children generation after generation. Education is the key here, so here come the book bans and restrictions on teaching actual history. The only thing that gives me hope is that they have to work harder and harder for diminishing returns, so maybe the pendulum of history really is moving.

I have noticed a trend in Texas.

I live in a rural county just south of San Antonio so I get the local and state political commercials all over the local news. The usual republican misrepresentations are there but there is something else going on. Every single candidate from both parties has expressed support for health coverage for people with preexisting conditions in almost all of their commercials. Of course the gop assertion is a lie, they are suing to have this protection removed from existing law without so much as a rough draft of its replacement, much less a specific plan to restore the preexisting condition protection.

I could go on about the content, but my point is this: The debate is being held on our turf, healthcare. It is never a good sign for a political party when their offer is "that thing you like about the other party."

About Trump's secrecy regarding medical history.

We have all noticed that he is abnormally guarded about any of his medical records being released, much like his tax or academic records. This was before the pandemic, with the diagnosis himself, he is down right obstinate even in the face of sharp criticism and a paramount need to know.

On the other hand, look how wide open he is about drugs he takes, whether they are risky, against sound advice or experimental. I get that it is all political, if there are drugs the pandemic is not that bad therefore go back to work, fix his economy and reelect him. But the gulf between his public proclamations of his drug regimen and the state secret nature of his health is enormous and the hypocrisy rivals the Supreme Court shenanigans.

San Anotnio Police shove "suspect" into car, admit it was the wrong man.

You know what grinds my gears about convention speech reaction?

When they say, "I didn't hear anything about blank", when it was there if you listen. The consensus on NBC, ABC and CBS today was that there was nothing about policy in Biden's speech. Plus Trump surrogates were echoing this in their 15-20 minute segments.

Let's review:
On covid-19, the policy will be guided by experts based on facts on the ground at the time. Shutting down the economy again would be a drastic measure only taken if Trump leaves the country in bad enough shape to require it. Republicans say he said he would just shut it down.

On the general economy, I heard about job creating plans to modernize our infrastructure and to move us toward green energy. I heard, but they did not, about help with child care so that working parents would not be stuck if they have to work.

Am I crazy to think I heard these things? Was I dreaming?

$200 or $600 a week? Let's let the people decide.

That's the rule for Supreme Court Justices in an election year, right? Simple internet poll should clear things up. It is our money after all, why can't we decide to share it evenly among ourselves? We can't wait for Biden to be elected to sort this out, this needs to be done last week.

My wife can't get a hospital bed for non-covid health issue.

We live near San Antonio, Texas. A few weeks ago, she started to feel nauseous and had a hardness in her upper abdomen. Symptoms got progressively worse until she could not hold down food and eventually even water made her vomit. I took her to the emergency room where she received intravenous fluids, had medicine prescribed and then was released. They put her on a liquid diet, which she tells me is a clear indication that she should have been admitted. Based on her history of being hospitalized, she has told me that they do not release you until you take in solid food and process it normally.

The medicine stabilized her condition for a time, but it did not improve. We have repeated the emergency room, IV, prescribe and release dance 3 times. The car ride there and back is intolerable for her, causing motion sickness. She does have Medicaid, but has to jump through hoops to get referrals for doctor's appointments. She finally has one tomorrow, but it is a video chat appointment. It's nice that the doctor has video chat capability at his end, but we only have internet through hot spots on our phones and no web cams. I have doubts about how that would work or if it will help at all.

All of this is happening in a state that rushed to reopen like Florida and had the state block local mask ordinances like Georgia. The general attitude was that the lockdown being over meant that the pandemic was over. When the surge became undeniable, the governor finally issued a state-wide mask mandate. He is catching hell from all sides, from people with common sense for doing it too late and from the idiots on the right, both in and out of government, for doing it at all. They still don't get it.

We are no longer arguing over competing theories like trade or tax policy. We have finally gone through all the bouts on the undercard, and are engaged in the championship fight: reality versus bullshit. Reality should be the favorite since objective proof exists. The only reason the fight continues is because reality fights fair and bullshit cheats. The right has a decades old infrastructure to discredit truth tellers, scientists, journalists and non-partisan career government officials, and were quick to whip it out for the corona virus.

The climate debate has shown us that the republicans would rather burn the whole world down before allowing the government to make it a little less profitable to do business. My wife can't get a hospital bed for non-covid health issue because the wealthy will fight tooth and nail to avoid being slightly less rich.