Rick Kinnaird

Friday, July 12, 2024

I know there’s lots to be worried about, but there are issues that just can’t wait.

These are not them.

In the world of tacky I have discovered a new entrant. Are You The One? or some name like that for a new Hallmark Series. It’s a competition to pick the right guy for Christmas. Twelve men (is it twelve? I dunno.) who look handsome in a “I like to take walks on the beach or the park, love dogs (or cats) and am remarkably empathetic” are competing in a new Christmas classic. And like Top Chef after each episode one is sent home. Instead of “Please pack your knives and go,” it’s “Brad, you will not be going home for Christmas.” 

I have always advocated for more violence o TV in these circumstances. What I’d like to see is team of dwarves dressed up like Santa’s helpers come out of the woodwork and attack the loser with whips a flails screaming, “Loser! Get out of here!” But, alas, I fear it will be more milque toast. Bleech! We need the writers of South Park or The Simpsons to add some good olde American dreck to the proceedings. 

OMG, what is wrong with this nation? We are producing shows like The Real Housewives of … and none of them look like the women I see in the supermarket. Real? There’s nothing real about any of them. Fake eyelashes and all. They’ve got a spin-off called The Valley. Did they get this idea from watching Saturday Night Live? 

So, we’ve got big problems and this is what people are watching? Or trying to be enticed to watch?

Me? I admit, I get sucked into watching snatches of video on Facebook. I was watching one on my phone the other day from Britain’s Got Talent. A young woman came on and Simon asked her a question a she responded, “You’ve probably heard my voice, but never seen my voice.”

“Oh? Why is that?” asked Simon.

“Because I sang Never Enough from the musical movie and the actress lip synched to my singing.”

All the judges sat back and this young lady from Brooklynn blew the room away.

Okay, now remember I said I was watching on my phone and the show was Britain’s Got Talent.

I switched to my computer to watch it. I typed in the woman’s name (Loren Allred), found her on YouTube and as I watched Simon asked his question. She aswered. He stared in open mouth amazement and she blew the room away.

But in the middle of her performance I noticed she was wearing a different dress than in her appearance on my phone. This was odd as the audio track was the same. Or, at least, I think it was, then I realized I was watching America’s Got Talent. 

So I think Simon Cowell deserves an award for his performance on one of these two shows for being gobsmacked a second time. Either that or he’s seen so many performances he can’t keep them straight and forgets.

And the Olympics are coming up! In the ads, they show Simon Biles doing a dismount that is her normal crazy double twist double somersault whatever. How does she do that? What exactly is she doing anyway? I don’t care. It makes me giggle and gives me the shivers every time I see it. And she’s got a new thing she’s going to be doing. It’s a double pike something or other. No other woman has attempted this. Biles has done it once in competition in 2021. Less than half a dozen men do it. One of them said of Biles that she is performing on a lower table (I guess this is a vault, but I don’t know what else a table could be) and she gets higher than he does when she does this move. He asks, “do you know the kind of strength you need to get that far up?” Uh, no. No, I don’t, but I’m guessing a lot. The next time you see the picture of Simon flying through the air with one leg straight in front of her and another behind, look at the top of her thigh. I had never paid attention but OMG that muscle is incredible. 

In other news, we are being barraged with the fact that Biden is old, and a little bit that Trump not only lies constantly but he says really inane things. Sarah Cooper (bless her heart) is tirelessly working to lip synch the most inane ones. Here’s his now infamous one about sharks and batteries and boats:

Sarah Cooper is lip syncing Trump again
byu/nikamats inTikTokCringe

Yeah, but Biden’s old.

ARE YOU PEOPLE OUT OF YOUR MINDS? 

Why is this even close? One guy has a stutter, which he has worked on all his life to overcome. He’s old. He moves a bit slow. He has senior moments.

The other guy is inane on a level rarely seen in public. It might be fun to have him sit on a seat in a dunk tank or put him on a show like I dunno The Apprentice? And have a team of judges say, “You’re fired” or “Please pack you knives and go,” or “Sorry, you won’d be coming home for Christmas,” or “Four years in jail for fraud on 34 counts, and twenty five more for exposing national secrets.” 

Yeah, but …

Tuesday, July 9, 2024

Do you remember the Whitewater Scandal? The Clinton’s had been in a land deal with a guy. The deal went bust and years later that same fellow did some fraudulent stuff. The Republicans in Congress tried – endlessly – to tie that fellow’s illegal activities to the Clintons. Nevermind that the activities were years apart. This went on and on. Finally, news broke that Bill had an affair with a 21 year old staffer. It turned out he only had a few failed blow jobs, but close enough to go crazy over. And, let’s not forget the only reason he was even in contact with the young lady was due to a government shutdown engineered by the Republicans. I, BTW, doig my civic duty reported the breaking of law by a Republican Senator named Ted who trespassed on government property that was shutdown, stole government property and littered. He and a bunch of soon to be MAGA people took saw horses from a closed National Park and deposited them at the White House in protest over their closing the government.

So then we had to hear endlessly about Monica Lewinsky. It went on all summer. Longer than Debby Boone’s on hit, which was a nice enough song but after hearing it every time you’d turn on the radio. At least Taylor Swift has different songs. Many sound the same, but still.

So why am I bringing this up? Good question. Well back when Monica and Bill’s name were in the news for as long as Debby was lighting up our lives I asked a woman I knew, “why?” I figured she’d know because she was a producer for a major news organization. She explained that when you only have 20 or 30 seconds to do a news item it is easier to add on to an existing story than try and explain in any depth a new story. We already know the players and the basic story so all a news report has to do is introduce updates. You can do that in 20 seconds. Hence the story lasts for way longer than it should.

This is what is now happening with Biden and the question of whether he should stay in the race or not.

A few people in Congress are saying he should step aside. Multiple pundits are reporting this and rehashing his poor performance. The debate was seen by the smallest audience to see a debate in years.

But, it’s an easy story to keep adding on to.

Yesterday, I heard a guy on the radio going on and on about the fact that Biden is old and then suggesting that maybe he should step aside. This took up most of the interview. Near the end he was asked replace Biden with who? Well, he didn’t know and that would have to be worked out by the Democratic party. Blah blah blah.

There’s little reporting of the great job Biden has been doing and is still doing. Maybe he’s too old? Yeah, maybe, but the evidence does not suggest that. He’s led us back from the brinks of disaster after disaster to having the strongest economy in the world today.

Let’s run through a few of his hits:

Covid: When he took office the Trump team refused to give the transition team any clue as to their roll out plan for getting Covid vaccinations out to people. the reason became startling clear as soon as Biden’s folks got in office. There was no plan.

Yet, Biden turned that around and people were getting immunized rapidly. What were Trump’s people doing at that time? Hld rallies saying vaccines were no good.

Afganistan: Trump likes to saywhat a disaster the pullout from Afganistan was. Let’s remember who created the circumstances for that pullout. Trump got the head of the Taliban out of jail, told him exactly when the U.S. was leaving. He even invited the guy to Camp David. Then the week before Biden took office he had the troops in Afganistan reduced to a minimal level. There was no way that any pullout would not be chaos. However, Biden and our troops did a remarkable job of getting many out. What had Trump’s team done? Well, Steven Miller, known racist and conspiracy theorist, had made sure that any of our Afgan interpreters and agents were not given asylum here in the U.S. as they had been promised. He did this throughout the Trump presidency.

Economy: There are lots of ways to look at the economy but by any measure the economy now is so much better than it was under Trump. Trump wanted to put in tariffs. He still wants to do that. He does not understand that tariffs are a tax on the people of this country. We pay for the increased price not the exporters. 

Jobs is another way to look at things. The job growth is way up. Trump was the first president since Hoover to have negative job figures. One can point to Covid as the culprit, and it was. but Covid also drove down the demand for gas and so the price of gas was lower. However, now job growth is up. Gas prices went up for awhile, but then Biden did something really clever. He relaesed gas from the government storage and stopped the price rise. He has been credited with breaking Opec’s stranglehold by doing this. He then bought the gs back when the price was lower making over half a trillion dollars for the government. Talk about art of the deal!

Prices have been going up, but that has now slowed. There seem to be two reasons for the price increases: people have money and many corporations face little competition so they can charge whatever they want. (thank Republican administartions for the latter.) However, the inflation rate has pretty much stabilized. 

the stock markets are at all time highs, causing many to say equities are overvalued, and that the economy will crash. Remember awhile back that’s what all the econonomic pundits were saying? They finally stopped saying it because it didn’t happen. Even Fox Business went so far as to say of Biden’s economic numbers, “if I had those numbers I’d run on it tt.”

Don’t forget the huge crisis at the ports. Covid was coming to what? an end? a dribble? All kinds of goods were waiting to be unloaded. This right after Biden took office. What happened? The huge crisis went away. Why? Biden sent people to fix it, that’s why.

But he’s old. 

Yeah. When I was first working in the factory and I critizied someone the fellow in charge of getting the job done looked at me and said, “What’s your idea?”

He looked at me, waiting to hear my answer He genuinely wanted to know. 

I had nothing.

He softly snorted, closed his eyes briefly, and moved on.

To all those whosay Biden’s too old I ask, “What’s your answer?”

Yeah, I thought so.

You got nothing.

Shut up. Let’s get to work.

Suggestion: Let’s elect someone who knows what they are doing. Has done it, and proven he can do it.

Someone who has done that over and over again,

Who fits that bill?

Yeah, but he’s old. Go to Suggestion.

Friday, July 6, 2024

The night of the debate many people made an amazing discovery. Joe Biden is old!

Wow. Keen observation.

To which I say, “Yeah?”

“Well, can he do the job?”

“Has he?”

“Yes.“

“What’s the question?”

“Joe Biden is old.”

“Um, that’s not a question.”

This debate, if it can even be called that, reminds me of a decision I had to make about replacing a washing machine. A guy at work asked me, “What’s in their now?”

“A Maytag.”

“How long has it been in there?”

“Twenty five years?”

“What’s the question?”

I put in a Maytag and it lasted twenty some years.

Joe Biden is old … older than when he first took office (duh). He has led the greatest economic recovery this nation has seen since FDR. Just like in FDR’s time Republicans have stood in the way, blocking anything and everything. Yet, they gladly come to the bridge openings and highway rebuildings that they voted against and try to take credit for it.

So let me ask you, “Who’s in their now? … What’s your question?”

Oh yes, he’s old. Is he doing the job? … What’s your question?

Wednesday, July 3, 2024

I have a few suggestions. Or as Johnathan Swift would say, “Modest proposals.”

But first we must define our terms and here is where Mussolini, Angelou, the duck and the snake come in.

First Mussolini, who coined the term Fascist, he said it was the combining of companies and government,

or corporations and politics, as far as I’m concerned the terms are the same.

Maya Angelou said, “when a person shows you who they are, believe them the first time.”

The duck – remember the old argument, “if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck”? No? Well, the answer is “It must be a duck.” (Boy, do I have to explain everything to you?” Don’t answer that – it’s rhetorical. That means … nevermind. No, it doesn’t mean nevermind it means forget it. Forget what? OMG.)

The snake – this parable is apparently Trump’s favorite. It’s the story of a snake that convinces someone to pick him up and carry him down the mountain (See the snake had been sunning himself but now the sun was going down and it was getting cold.) That someone at first said no because he’s a snake (Yes, the snake is a snake. The “he” refers to the snake. OMG.) But the snake says, “I won’t bite you. Please take me off this moutain or I might die from the cold.” The kid (I guess it’s a kid who is the ‘someone’.) finally relents because who’s ever seen a talking snake? (Cut to the talking frog kiss becomes a prince? No. Okay.) They get to the bottom of the mountain and the snake bites the kid. As the kid lies dying (of course it’s a poisonous snake!) The kid asks, “Snake, why did you bite me?” and the snake replies, “You knew who I was and what I was before you picked me up.” Tah-Dah! (This is called a moral.) And a sub-moral (???) is “don’t pick up snakes.”

The parable of the snake is one of Donald Trump’s favorites. (How do I know? I read it on the internet.)

So if Fascism is the marriage of politics and corporations and if you see someone in our political structure that is bending over backwards to help corporations by their political manuevering then that person is a fascist. And if you see soeone trying to influence a politician by using their corporate or wealth to influence (ie “buying them off”) that person is also a fascist. A fascist coud be a politician or a rich corporate f*ck.

So if my terms are acceptable (Men in Black – the bug) then let’s look at various people on both the political and the corporate side of things and see if they are fascists. 

I think another simple way to determine this is to ask yourself if the person in question is at all interested in helping you (not you specifically but people like you – okay?)

Here’s a simple set of questions from the corporate side of fascism:

1. Are you a rich f*ck?

a. Have you ever done anything to help others?

(If no – you’re a fascist. If yes then probably not.”)

For example ask yourself this, “Do you think Elon Musk gives a sh*t about you?”

What about Mark Cuban?

(Answers: No and Yes) Cuban has helped a lot of people become rich. He still could be a fascist but there is evidence to say he is not because he seems to care about others. Musk? Do you think Musk cares about you?)

Let’s look at the political side of fascism. 

A. Do you live your political life to please the people or corporations?

(No examples here. Not necessary.)

So if we apply these questions and terms to various people we can drop the facade that there are “conservatives” in our political system. They are faciists. They probably would prefer to be called conservative, because it doesn’t sound as bad. To me conservative means you want to “conserve.” Conserve what? Conserve what you have be it food, water, money, gas – whatever. So, are these people whom we call conservative conserving anything? Maybe their money in that they work hard to not pay taxes and in the case of Trump he conserves his money by not paying anyone unless he has a gun to his head. That’s not conservative in my mind that’s fraud but lets not quibble. 

The people who advocate conserving land and water are riddiculed by these “conservatives.” 

Applying Maya’s principle of believing someone the first time when you see them for who they are ask yourself, “what are they?”

We are doing ourselves a diservice by calling the Supreme Court justices who side with corporations most of the time “conservative.” They are not. They aren’t conserving anything. Not our rights, our resources, our way of life – nothing. In fact, one could argue they are recklessly spending our democracy. Giving away our rights, our freedoms, and our way of life to help a few who want to rule over us.

They are fascists.

So let’s call them what they are.

Monday, July 1, 2024

I was watching John Oliver’s latest episode of his show Last Week Tonight which aired June 24th 2024. He discussed the UK Elections and reviewed the most recent batch of UK Prime Ministers and their economic decisions. 

These decisions are the kind of thing that conservatives advocate, be it there or in the USA. The idea is to cut taxes (mainly on the rich) and the belief is that by doing so the economy will get better. 

In our country this kind of thinking has been a mainstay of the Republican Party since Reagan. And in Britain since Thatcher, who was in charge when Reagan was our President.

Here’s the fascinating thing. It hasn’t worked. Since the 1980s this idea has been a guiding principle a mainstream party in each country. Everytime they cut taxes the debt goes up and the economy goes down, yet they keep advocating it.

Oliver pointed out that from Cameron on these PMs have insisted on cutting taxes and doing other economically suicidal things like getting out of trade deals. When they don’t have any money they insist on cutting programs and benefits. This with devasting consequences. Children in Britain are shorter then their parents. Why? They are under nourished. Their health care system has been decmiated. Their trade has gone way way down. The country is a disater. These were all choices that were made – consciously, despite being warned, and told exactly what woud happen.

It kind of remids me of Galloping Gertie. A bridge in Tacoma, Washington (state) that collapsed in 1940.

My dad told me that the folks in charge were warned that the bridge wasn’t strong enough. Those people didn’t believe that a bridge made of steel and concrete could be twisted and the roadway flap like a ribbon and then collapse. Not only were they warned they were shown models of what would happen. Four months after it opened the wind twisted it and the roadway heaved up and down like a ribbon being flapped at one end, and it collapsd and fell into the sound.

Kind of like the economy of Britain after Brexit. John had a video of one company owner. She sold tea. Many of her customers were in Europe. Before Brexit she could ship tea all over Europe. After Brexit it was so difficult because it required paperwork, paying duties, and then the stuff sat for weeks or months waiting to be cleared. Finally, she moved her business to the European Continent.

Who was it that said, “the definiton of crazy is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result?” Since 1980 the mantra of what are called conservatives is to cut taxes. There are two parts to this: one, somehow the economy will get better. This is known as “trickle down.” Two, although taxes get cut the reality is that most people don’t see any reduction in their taxes. It seems only the rich and corporations see their taxes get cut. Yet, the politicians who advocate this keep saying it works, despite no evidence that it does. When faced with no money these same politicians then say,, “Well, we have to cut services.” This leads to the rich getting richer. They don’t need these services. And the poor, who desperately need these services, get poorer and less able to cope. This isn’t some pie in the sky “Well maybe …” kind of thing, statistics show this is exactly what is happening.

One of the recent Prime Ministers presented a plan for the economy of Britain. It was hailed on Fox Business and elsewhere as a great conservative plan. She lasted the least amount of time of any prime minister. The apparent destructive nature of her plan was so obvious that it never got off the ground, and she was gone a few weeks later.

Ah me, what to do? Maybe, we should embrace these ideas of the so called conservatives. 

Price of gas too high? Eliminate the gas tax. 

Roads and bridges falling apart? Get rid of them. Sell them off to private investors and let them collect tolls. then everyone pays, especially those electric vehicles that don’t use gas and the bikers (not the motorcycle people those pedal power people who are trying to save the Earth by not using gas.)

Wake up. What are you talking about?

Football stadiums. I just saw where the owner of the Jaguars is getting a new stadium courtesy of the folks down there, or at least their politicians. I’m for quid pro quo. I do something for you; you do something for me. You want a new stadium and you want me to pay for it? Fine. Then I get to go to events in that stadium for free, deal? No? Putting in a stadium is a huge drain on the municipality’s resources, and it doesn’t add anything positive to the local economy. (Check the statistics.) You have to improve roads and bridges (oh wait, we gave those away to someone who is backing up traffic collecting tolls.) And all the foreigners, I mean out-of-towners, are coming in trampling over everything and making a mess of the place and you want me to pay you so they can do this? What is wrong with you? Yeah, that would mean that everyone who put up the money for you gets to go to events there for free. Oh, you’ll pay for it yourself? Great. I can’t wait to tax you for the privlege of putting a stadium up there.

Should I go on?

No?

Okay.