Archives for June 2022

Thursday, June 30, 2022

It’s been three days since Ms Hutchinson gave her testimony. We are in the phase where lawyers and experts are explaining the significance of what she said.

Let’s start with the one thing various fake news outlets are jumping up and down about – The Beast.

The Beast is the name given to the Presidential Limo. These fake news pundits and their coterie of “I’m not a news person I’m an opinionist” are saying it would be near impossible for anyone in the back of that limo to reach the driver’s steering wheel. Ah yes. Maybe so. But others who have ridden with past presidents point out that the vehicle Liz Chaney showed in the hearing was not The Beast but a Suburban. Now if the ex-president had been getting into a Chevy Suburban instead of The Beast it would be relatively easy to lunge over the seat and try to grab the wheel. In fact, most moms point out that their four year olds try to do it regularly. And the ex-president acting as a four year old? … well, need I say more?

Okay, I’ll say more.

What Ms Hutchinson’s testimony has done, say the lawyers, is connect the players. We thought we knew, but now we know. The connection has been made from The Chief of Staff for The President, Mark Meadows, all the way to the war room at The Willard Hotel. This connects Meadows to Stone, Bannon, Giuliani, The Proud Boys, and The Oathkeepers. According to lawyers this does not connect Trump directly. So ya got ask, “Given Trump’s sticking his nose into every little detail and not letting anything be done without his approval is there anyway he didn’t know?” To actually make the connection they’ll need Meadows to testify.

During the 2nd Impeachment many charges were made based on circumstantial evidence, now these charges are being made on direct evidence. If so Trump faces six or seven separate Federal charges. Most carry a five year imprisonment. Sedition carries twenty. 

Now here’s perhaps the most compelling part of Ms Hutchinson’s testimony. The ex-president knew the mob was armed on Federal property (an offense.) He didn’t care because he knew “They aren’t coming for me.” So much for the “lotta love” defense, or the “I’d didn’t know” defense. He also then directed the mob to go to the Capital. He wanted to go too.

Here’s something I didn’t know. The Secret Service is sworn to protect democracy, whatever that means, but let’s game this out.

Suppose Trump actually went to the Capital and the mob was attacking the police. Let’s say that the Secret Service detail of Vice President Pence got into a tussle with the mob and ended up face to face with the ex-president’s detail. What would they do?

Okay. Here’s another one. It is one I’ve always wondered about. Why didn’t the police at the Capital fire on the crowd? The answer is that they knew the crowd was armed with AR15s. The police were outgunned. Imagine if a firefight had broken out? First off we’d be seeing blood on the Capital steps. Secondly, the police could have been slaughtered and the mob could have been free to roam the building searching for Pence and Pelosi and anyone else.

Okay. back to Ms Hutchinson. Trump says he barely knew her and uses all the phrases he always uses when he is disparaging a woman. I make the point that it’s a woman because he has different phrases of disparagement for men. Others have said she was just a glorified coffee girl. Really? That’s why she knew all the top players on a first name basis? 

When you’re Chief of Staff and you want to go to the Willard Hotel to consult with the coup plotters who ya gonna tell so the Secret Service can make the arrangements? Cassidy Hutchinson.

And isn’t it ironic that a 25 year old on basically her first job assignment after college advises this guy. “That’s not a good idea.”

When the president tell the mob he’s marching with them to the Capital who ya gonna call if you’re Minority Speaker of the House and you want to make sure it ain’t happening? Cassidy Hutchinson. “Kevin, that decision has already been made.” (ie He’s not going. Got it Kevin?)

When the ex-president has a hissy fit and throws his food who helps clean it up? Yeah.

When the Secret Service head of the detail needs help who does he call upon?

Who knows better than anyone else who saw the president, when, and what documents were presented to him? Ditto for the Chief of Staff.

Now we get to the reason, I think, they rushed to get this woman’s testimony is witness intimidation. Liz Chaney read and displayed a number of messages that some witnesses have received. She didn’t say who sent them, but they read like a mob boss trying to demand “loyalty.” Hum, who could it be sending these messages? Oh wait, Michael Cohen got messages like this from Donald Trump. In fact, the same phrases were used. Prosecutors, I am told, don’t believe in coincidences. This shot across the bow was aimed directly at you-know-who. I don’t think the shot was aimed across the bow, more like midships.

Carry on.

I’ll be in touch.

Wednesday, June 29, 2022

I was sitting in a bar the other day. An Irish bar, called Muphy’s. Who could have guessed an Irish bar would be called Murphy’s? Okay, two tries. Maybe, three.

They were playing 90s rock videos. Music after my time, but I at least recognized it or the group named. and I came to a startling conclusion. The song I had heard for years and the name of a song by T-Rex called “Bang a Gong” were one and the same! Yeah. that’s my big learn for the week.

In other news, the person who thought Hugh Jackson as Wolverine would be the surprise witness was so totally wrong. Obviously, they didn’t think it through. With those metal fingers how would he get through the metal detectors? Slash and Burn.

What else? Apparently at least three of the Fox commentators were stunned into silence by the truth. Not Donald! He used his standard “woman dismissive” diatribe. it kind of reminds me of Dan Akroyd’s “Jane, you ignorant slut” routine. 

Katie Ledecky continues to stun the world with her swimming. In the 1500 she came in 14 seconds ahead of the second place finisher and in the 800 it was 10 seconds. That’s crazy. The weirdest thing is that she doesn’t even look like she’s swimming that hard.

I long for the time when people sang you could understand the words. I’d like a return to culture, civility, manners, being suave and debonair. Ah me. Don’t say it! I know what you are thinking. Practice some restraint. That’s the first rule of savoir faire. 

This brings me to politics and cricket. I’ve told this before, but I’ll tell it again. I was watching an episode of “All Creatures Great and Small.” The vets were engaged in a Sunday afternoon picnic and cricket game. The young doc hit the ball. It went off the pitch into a river and was retrieved from there. After the game, no one would talk to him, or only in the briefest of terms. I didn’t know if he had done a terrible thing or if perhaps everyone had bet against him and he had hit the equivalent of a bases loaded home run.

I decided to look up the rules of cricket in the Encyclopedia Britannica. (It was a long time ago.)

Okay. So. There’s a batsman and a pitcher. The field is homeplate and second base with a pitcher’s mound. Behind homeplate is the wicket. Three sticks set upright in the ground. On top of the three sticks are balanced two blocks of wood. The idea is that the pitcher hurls the ball trying to knock the two blocks of wood off the sticks. The batsman stands at homeplate and deflects the ball, thus protecting the wicket.

Okay, I understood all that. BTW I am not using, perhaps, the proper terminology, but that’s the idea. Oh and the pitcher has to throw overhand with the arm straight. He can run forward toward the stopping point, like the pitcher’s rubber and hurl the ball in a big arc motion toward the wicket.

Okay, got all that. Then the article said the batsman hits the ball and the “runners cross.” Runners Cross? What runners? Where did they come from? 

The problem I discovered was that the Encyclopedia I had bought was a British version and it assumed some basic knowledge of the game.

In politics and culture and manners there are some assumptions. Like we want to be polite. Or we want to help people, maybe do the most good for the most people. Or we don’t want to be gross on purpose.

None of those assumptions can be assumed anymore. Not since Newt Gingrich in politics or The Simpsons in entertainment. It used to be funny, I thought, to pretend to be uncouth. Not anymore because it is no longer known by most that you are doing it on purpose for effect. Rather, it is considered the norm.

Rudy Giuliani back when he was sane, said that when listening to wiretaps you could tell when the gangsters had seen The Godfather, because they now knew how they were supposed to talk. We’ve had two generation that have grown up on “South Park” and “The Simpsons.” Is it any wonder that young people are boorish and uncouth? Now they are adults raising kids. Bring back Cary Grant, please.

Of course, at that time blacks were segregated, women had to fight to get the vote, and society was limited to the few and the rich. Not much has changed.

Except, one party is openly dismissive of our ideals as a country. All the while they are puffing out their chests and proclaiming how patriotic they are. And religious. Obviously, they have not read the history of this country and the reasons why are forefathers did what they did.

On the other hand, do we really want to hold up as our standard of justice and logic what a bunch of guys in the 1700s thought? Do we really want to be ruled by the religious thoughts of people from the Iron or Bronze Ages?

Let’s vote. Let’s tax what is rendered unto Caesar. Let’s return to being polite and civil. If people don’t want to do that let’s crucify them.

Oh yes. The testimony. Trump is a four year old child. All the excuses have now crumbled by facts and evidence under sworn testimony. The nitpickers have begun to swarm. They have little to pick. They say that Trump didn’t grab the steering wheel like she said. Oh yeah? Let’s put them under oath. You know, like Ginnie Thomas was going to do. In fact, she couldn’t wait to set the record straight. Now? She’s declining. My my, you have this big opportunity to get it all out there and you don’t want to? Maybe, you don’t want to join Ms Maxwell for twenty years?

So why did the committee want to rush to get this testimony down? I have two reasons: one, they were afraid she’d be targeted, either for death or to shut up. Two, they wanted to encourage others to come forward.

Isn’t it interesting how all these so called patriots and enablers are refusing to say anything under oath?

Michael Flynn taking the fifth was particularly egregious. I mean, even on basic questions of principle that he was willing to spout off about in rallies. Under oath? Not so much.

Come on, Mike Lindell. You have all the evidence. Rudy has all the numbers. Just give it to them. Oh wait, Rudy never had the numbers? Only theories. Got it. Lindell? You know it’s interesting how they claim all this stuff and then – nothing. I liked the guy from Michigan who said to Trump and Rudy, “give me the names.” Of the dead voters, of the illegal immigrants who voted. They never did. I wish he had pulled a Tartuffe and badgered them every day for the names. “Hey, I really want to get to the bottom of this. I need the names. Can you send them pronto?” And do that everyday twice a day. When Donald calls tell him, “We are on it. Yes in deedy. All we need is the names. We are waiting on your man Rudy. Don’t know what the hold up is.”

Of course I wanted Brett to explain his drinking game in his confirmation hearing too. I wonder if Susie Collins would have voted for him if she understood the game. Maybe Brett and Gorsuch could have demonstrated it on her. “Hey Susan, are you going to vote to confirm me?” “Argh and argh argh …”

As National Lampoon quipped about Vincent Van Gogh, “it’s hard to hear you with a banana in my ear.”

Likewise, it’s hard to talk with a similarly shaped item in your mouth being thrusted in and out.

What? Oh, it’s gross? Indeed.

Tell that to the twelve year old forced to have a baby.

Tuesday, June 28, 2022

Well, I have to say how disappointed I am. The big reveal was a 25 year old assistant to Mark Meadows who was in or near the room where it happened on January 6th. She related how Trump attacked members of his staff, threw food and dishes, seized the steering wheel of the Presidential Limo, said how the rioters were doing nothing wrong, and how Mike Pence “deserved it” (ie being hung.) And I thought the big reveal was going to be Kim Kardashian was having an affair with the Donald. After all their media stars have faded a bit, so why not reveal an affair and get back in the spotlight? I mean she ruined Marilyn’s dress with her big butt why not ruin him? Oh well, I’ll get over it.

So why the push to have the hearing now? Maybe before she gets killed or so threatened that she would refuse to testify? Liz Chaney revealed that several people have been told to stay loyal. Hum. Why would anyone stay loyal to DJT?

He’d throw you under the bus or steamroller in a quick second.

And then all the people asking for pardons! OMG! I guess they knew they committed crimes.

Then there’s Rudy. He got a pat on the back and he says it was like a cannon ball, or some such. I like the idea someone proposed of charging him with making false statements. Or another way to look at it is, if that was a huge potential knock down, then what happened at the Capital on Jan 6th was armageddon.

That is all. Carry on. And get everyone you know to vote.

Sunday June 26, 2022

The kid is in Providence, Rhode Island overseeing my grandson stacking coffee cups. And us waiting for the famous Providence WaterFire celebration.

I don’t have a lot of time to worry and complain.

When I was a young man Roe was decided.

The year before that the anti-abortionists had reported how many illegal abortions they thought were done in the state of Virginia.

I knew an old German doctor who performed abortions illegally in that state. His wife said that if the anti-abortionists’ figure was correct, her husband had performed them all.

At that time, if you were rich and got pregnant and wanted an abortion you went to Denmark.

But if you were poor?

Eighteen years after Roe there was a drop in the crime rate in many urban cities.

The mayors and police chiefs all took credit for the drop.

Malcolm Gladwell wrote that perhaps the biggest reason was the drop in unwanted children that would have come of age at that time due to Roe 18 years before.

Back in the 1700s Thomas Malthus proposed his theory that population growth will outrun food supply and that improvement in humankind is impossible without limits on population growth. This led to the zero population growth movement, which was pretty successful until Reagan killed it off in a deal with the Pope. This was the beginning of religion, once again, interfering in politics. Reagan went on to kill unions and destroy the middle class. This is where the modern decline of the middle class in America began. After World War II the USA had spectacular economic growth. There were several reasons for this growth. One was that most of the industrial world except for the U.S. was destroyed. The other reason was that The GI Bill, allowed returning service people to go to college. Of course women, blacks and native Americans were not allowed to participate in these benefits.

Then we as a nation turned our back on what made us great. Jack Hird, one of the world’s leading statistical quality control engineers who did systems work at Ford and later Western Electric said to me that the difference between Japan and the U.S. after the war was that the Japanese listened to the other world’s leading statistical quality engineer, Edward Demming, and the U.S. ignored Hird’s advice. And guess what? The Japanese surpassed us in automobile quality. Meanwhile the rest of the world passed us in health care.

We built the Interstate Highway System under Eisenhower then refused to fund the maintenance of it. We decided under Truman to not have Universal Health Care like Britain and instead went for a company sponsored system. Lose your job – lose your health care. 

Doctors in Britain are rewarded for making patients healthy. Those doctors are very good at diagnosing people with just a stethoscope. Our doctors, afraid of being sued, order expensive tests and have low skills with a stethoscope.

When I was a kid, people in Europe had the image of us as cowboys. Now? We are regarded with disbelief as we can’t seem to stop the slaughter of our children and citizens. I was in Cambodia recently. Everyone there knows someone the Khmer Rouge killed. During the days of the Killing Fields some 2-4 million people were killed. We in the U.S. have reached that number between the people shot and those that died from Covid. Now in Cambodia guns are not allowed except for police and military and even then you need a permit for a specific time to take those weapons out on the street. No permit? Jail. Simple.

Yet, we can’t figure out how to stay healthy, avoid a virus or a gunshot, and our students and poor are left destitute.

Why worry?

Well, we are being controlled by a minority. They have extreme dangerous ideas, which they wish to inflict on all of us. Democracy, independence and thinking are an anathema to them. Guns, hate, religion – only theirs, inflicted hurt and poverty, violence are the norm. Why worry? Who cares?

You know, I’ve heard some of this hateful racist religious gun toting crap my whole life. Well, from five on. None of it is true and if you confront one of them with facts they say, “I don’t believe it.” It’s not a matter of belief.It’s a matter of fact. Truth. However, these people have been courted with lies, half truths, and stupidity.

Why? To be controlled and robbed. Robbed of their money, their independence, their dignity. But they’ll go to their deaths saying the opposite. Herman Cane? Meatloaf? Dead. Why? They believed! They believed a lie. They stood up for the lie. They died because of it. So have millions of others. Willing to die to a virus or a gunshot to support the lie. Willing to give up their riches and live in poverty and have zero chance of success, Why? Because they see other people on yachts, while their boat languishes on the shore, waiting for the rising tide.

Will we rise up? Will we confront the dangers? Will we work together to improve our lot?

How many more need to die?

How many more need to be told what they can do with their bodies?

Time to commit to voting, to standing up to stupidity and to lies.

Sunday, June 19, 2022

The January 6th Committee has now held three public hearings and it’s time to review what they have revealed. Much of it is stuff that was known or thought to be known, but now it’s on the record. There was a Facebook meme that pointed out that the people who said the former president knew he lost are under oath as saying so; the ones who say he didn’t lose have refused to testify under oath. 

What has been established, not beyond a reasonable doubt, but as fact is that ex-president Trump was told repeatedly by his inner circle and everyone else that he lost the election. There were two people: Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman who were pushing the idea that he hadn’t lost and that he could overturn the results of the election. Eastman is particularly interesting because he was acting as the ex-president’s lawyer. He admitted to Mike Pence’s legal advisor that his case for overturning the election would lose in the Supreme Court 9-0. He also asked for a pardon, which he did not get. 

Why he didn’t get a pardon is interesting because it goes to the heart of the problem for Trump. According to a 1915 Supreme Court decision asking for a pardon is an admission of guilt and if what he is guilty of is conspiracy to do something like say overthrow the government with whom is he guilty? There is only one person because he was working for only one person – the president of the United States. To pardon Eastman it would require laying out the crime, to do so would implicate Trump, therefore no pardon.

In his deposition for the January 6th Committee he took the 5th over one hundred times. He knows he’s guilty, and therefore so is Trump.

…

Late in the week The New York Times issued a video that showed The Proud Boys who were on the Capital grounds and where they were during the attack. They did not dress in clothing that would make them identifiable. Rather, to use their wording, they dressed as “normals.” They spread out across the front of the crowd at various points of attack. There were at least three on any front shown in the videos of them inciting the crowd, harassing the police, and removing – literally – the police barriers. The removal of the barriers allowed the crowd to surge forward unimpeded. The NYT video team identified five points of attack where the Proud Boys were instrumental in breaking through resistance and leading the crowd forward. 

Also, a document called the 1776 document was filed in court by the Proud Boys lawyers. I’m not sure why they filed it, but it outlines a plan for occupying key buildings on the capital grounds, mainly the Senate and Congressional office buildings. It is alleged that The Proud Boys did not create the document but rather it was given to them by the girl friend of the leader of the group. Where she got it is not known to me at this time.

Also, the Jan 6th Committee showed footage of a tour being led the day before Jan 6th by a Congressman from Georgia. It shows someone photographing a stairwell. The one that leads to Nancy Pelosi’s office. Also, he photographed a security point and the tunnel connecting to the Capital. Curiously, the Capital Police have said they see no evidence of anything unusual in this. (Really? It has been said that these are not normal tourist photo spots. Like this has to be pointed out.) The Congressman at first denied leading any tour that day. He attacked the Congresswoman from New Jersey who as a helicopter pilot in combat had been trained to spot unusual situations and she had pointed out that she had seen tours on January 5th and thought it suspicious. What did the Congressman from Georgia do at the time of the assertion? He called for the Congresswoman to be investigated for an ethics violation. 

Now, said Congressman has done some amazing backpedaling. First, he denied leading a tour on that day. Then it was, well, yeah he did lead a tour but so what? Then it was he didn’t really know the people in the tour. Okay, how unusual is it for a member of Congress to personally lead a tour? Real unusual. Maybe, they did it for their immediate family. Usually, a staff member might do it. However, the Capital was not allowing visitors or tours because of Covid. So why was a member of Congress leading a tour the day before a violent insurrection on the Capital and why was he showing them places that most visitors would not care about? That were security check points and access to key officials’ offices? (The best excuse so far is that the tunnel has kids’ drawings in it and they were photographing them. Yeah, right.)

And lastly, let’s look at Bill Stepien. His testimony to the Jan 6th Committee is interesting because he not only verified that everyone on Trump’s team knew he had lost the election, including Trump, but he said that an intoxicated Rudy was saying they should declare victory even before all the ballots were counted. Stepien went on to divide the election crew into two groups: Team Rudy and Team Normal. He went on to say how he didn’t want his reputation to be sullied by this fiasco. Let me be clear about Mr Stepien – there is nothing normal about this guy and his reputation. He was in the thick of the icky stuff Chris Christie was doing during Bridgegate. He is currently leading the campaign of the person trying to oust Liz Cheney. He has been at the center of some sleazy lying Republican campaigns, and continues to be. This is not normal stuff. Well, I guess you can argue that lots of Republicans are doing it so therefore it is the new normal, but really?

Lastly, I think it is worth noting that the people the Jan 6th Committee had shown as testifying were not Democrats but Republicans. These were inner circle Trump supporters and family members. 

The most stunning thing to me was how Bill Barr and others were willing to say under oath that what Trump was doing was BS, but didn’t have the guts to do it before. Take Mike Pence, he waited until the last second to say no to Trump. Imagine if he had done it earlier and publicly? Would the insurrection have happened? Would thousands of people come to the Capital to back up The Proud Boys? What if the Republicans in the Senate had actually done their job and impeached the President? We wouldn’t have this mess.

Now? Now we move on to the Senators who were in on the plot to overthrow the government of the United States. Two names stand out: Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley. Sedition is a hard thing to prove and to get a conviction in court. Yet, there are now five instances where the Justice Department has brought those charges.

We are in a race against time. Trump and his henchmen have moved to elect people willing to overturn elections if they don’t win. Trump has raised 250 million dollars since January 6th all for an organization that doesn’t exist. Is that fraud? You betcha. Will he get away with it? Maybe. He’s gotten away with fraud time and again. Now his lawyers are asking for delays because there are currently seven cases against Trump and they can’t be in seven places at once. Too bad. So sad. Get more lawyers. I saw a billboard advertising some. You know the kind, “Have You Been Injured?” Yeah. Donnie get more lawyers and whine about how you’ve been injured. 

PS Photo of one of three altar legs from Piedras Negras, Mexico. This one in the Philadelphia Museum. (It’s Mayan. I was on an Egyptian tour but snuck away for a moment.)