Hopefully 2021 will be better, but given the state of the country and the world, I am not betting on it.
Stay safe field hands.
I'm out of pocket field hands. Enjoy the holidays with your loved ones.
Stay safe, and if you happen to live in or around Nashville, Tennessee, be extra vigilant. These are scary times.
"In the weeks before the Nov. 3 election, as polling suggested that former Vice President Joe Biden might stand on the precipice of a landslide victory, many who had spent the past four years fighting President Donald Trump took solace in a silver lining: Trump, with his egregious behavior and his penchant for saying the quiet part out loud, had removed a bandage that in recent decades has hidden America’s deepest defects on race. In doing so, many of his opponents believed, he had presented us with a once-in-a-generation opportunity to fix them.
But election night brought a shock, if not a surprise, for those eager for the country to turn over a new leaf. While Biden remains favored to collect enough electoral votes to win and become the next President, the striking reality of the small gap between the two contenders left many despondent and fearful. This was not the total repudiation of Trump and Trumpism that so many had hoped for. Instead, in some quarters, it amounted to an embrace, with Trump actually increasing the total number of votes he’d received in 2016. Trump removed the gauze, but rather than healing the wound, we may now be watching it fester.
It’s no surprise that many Americans are only now catching on to this country’s long history of systemic racism. In history class, most Americans learn of the past horrors of slavery and Jim Crow, but the line isn’t always drawn to the present. When it is, it’s often presented as a long arc of progress, one that “bends toward justice,” as famously described by Martin Luther King Jr. and often repeated in political rhetoric, most famously by President Barack Obama. But the reality is that race–and racism–continues to profoundly shape American life.
Four years of Trump have accelerated the learning. The COVID-19 pandemic–which has killed people of color at higher rates than their white counterparts–has exposed the health disparities that divide this country. His campaign for “law and order” has only inflamed tensions and further highlighted the mistreatment that many Black Americans are likely to face at the hands of law enforcement. He attempted to schedule a rally on Juneteenth in Tulsa, Okla., the site of a 1921 massacre of Black people, inadvertently bringing attention to both the history of violence against Black Americans and the Juneteenth holiday, which celebrates the freeing of the enslaved. And that was just this year.
Some white Americans have reacted with outrage to this newfound understanding, joining Black Lives Matter rallies and reckoning with race in the workplace, at school and with friends. The marches this summer that captured the nation’s attention, occurring in small towns and metropolises alike, are thought to be the largest mass demonstration in American history, collectively drawing nearly 9% of the country to the streets, according to data-science firm Civis Analytics.
And yet nothing really changed. Gridlock in Washington stymied even modest reform efforts. Trump doubled down, using the unrest to stoke his base’s fears of social unrest and crime with a seemingly endless stream of shock-and-awe television ads and dramatic rhetoric in his speeches. By the end of the summer, the marches still continued, but their strength–and, most important, their resonance with the larger American public–had started to fade. Why that happened and what can be done about it will be the work of the months to come.
When it came time to vote, tens of millions of Americans evidently shrugged off the racism. Many say they don’t like Trump’s handling of race but prefer his approach to the economy. That makes sense: sacrificing the welfare of a minority group for economic prosperity may not be uniquely American, but it is a part of the American DNA. For some others, Trump’s stoking of racial hostilities has been more a feature of his presidency than a bug. At Trump’s rallies, adoring crowds repeated and amplified the President, whether it was his reference to COVID-19 as “Kung flu” or adopting a chant of “Send her back” in reference to Ilhan Omar, a member of Congress born in Somalia.
For centuries, political leaders in the U.S. have used race as a cudgel to shore up support from white Americans, particularly those for whom racial hierarchy afforded a sense of status they otherwise lacked. White Southerners supported slavery–going as far as fighting and dying over it in the Civil War–even though most of them could not afford to own a slave. They did so because it gave them a higher social status. In the 1960s Richard Nixon used the infamous Southern strategy, which created the current electoral map, to stir up fear of Black empowerment and persuade white Southerners to vote for him.
These are Trump’s strategic predecessors. Immersed in data, his campaign built an engagement strategy around speaking to his largely unwavering base and motivating new, largely white voters sold on Trump’s personality and showmanship and his message of grievance. Not relying similarly on data, Trump still effectively channels his campaign’s messaging with constantly calibrated applause lines to test what energizes his audience. Trump’s fanning the flames of racial resentment tells us a lot about who he is; his crowd’s roaring response tells us more about where we are as a nation.
Biden is deeply aware of this fissure. He ran on healing it, and exit polls show he won over voters concerned about racial justice. Betting that most Americans believe in equality and justice, among other democratic values, Biden referred to his campaign as a “battle for the soul of the nation.” With more than 70 million votes received and counting, Biden may be favored to win the election, but to uproot the forces that perpetuate the deeply entrenched racism in this country, it’ll take more than maybe half the country." [Link]
Something else is happening; white Americans are slowly losing their majority status. So now, coupled with racism, you have fear. trump, to his credit, has seen that, and he has done everything in his power to exploit it. It worked for him once, and it almost worked again.
It's why he and so many of his supporters are having such a hard time letting go and accepting the reality that he loss. Sadly for him, there were just enough minorities and conscious white folks voting to deny him a second term. trump is bitter and angry, and so is his base. For them, this election meant more than just having someone in the White House. To them, it was personal.
Donald trump has now raised over 200 million dollars thanks to his big lie that the election was stolen from him, and there was wide spread voter fraud throughout the land. There was none.
The suckers people who have fallen for this man's con game have given their hard earned money to him so that he can continue to maintain his lifestyle post presidency. It's amazing that they can't spot the con game and see it for what it is, but I guess when you are blinded by your own insecurities and shortcomings it's hard to see the reality of what's happening right in front of you. The Doobie Brothers wrote and sang a song about these types of people a while back.
Sadly, as sad and pathetic as trump's followers are, they pale in comparison to the elected republican politicians who seem to both fear and worship him at the same time. These men who are supposed to be America's brightest and best, have simply made a mess of their once proud party, and they are on their way to making a mess of American democracy. Just think about this for a minute: Vladimir Putin congratulated Joe Biden on wining the election before the leading republican in Washington did. That's a stunning fact, even by 2020 standards.
David Graham, writing in The Atlantic, sums up what we have been dealing with like this:
"When Donald Trump was granted a coat of arms for his Scottish golf courses in 2012 (after a lengthy court battle, of course), he chose as its motto “Numquam concedere”: Never concede. He has not, even as it has become clear that he lost the presidential election by a wide margin.
In the first few weeks after the election, anonymous Republicans and White House officials insisted that Trump’s lack of a concession was no reason for alarm. They assured reporters that Trump knew he’d lost and just needed time to process his defeat—and to put up enough of a fight that he could maintain his image. Perhaps that was true, and perhaps it remains true now, but Trump isn’t acting like someone working through the stages of grief. He’s acting like someone working through a slow-motion (and probably doomed) autogolpe.
Instead of Republican officeholders waiting out Trump’s postelection tantrum, he is waiting them out, and slowly bringing the party around to his side. In this way, Trump is ending his presidency just the way he won it: by correctly recognizing what Republican voters want and giving it to them, and gradually forcing the party’s purported leaders to follow along.
This embrace of the president’s attempt to overturn the results of the election is both shocking and horrifying. As Trump’s fraud claims and legal cases have steadily failed, the arguments he has pursued have become more outlandish and absurd, and they have also become more disturbing. Many Republican voters agree, and in refusing to stand up to him and them, Republican officials have gone from coddling a sore loser to effectively abandoning democracy."
The thing is, Donald trump is a loser, and he always has been.
Now, only time will tell if he will bring down an entire political party and make them all losers as well.
That was the one sentence Order from the Supreme Court denying the ridiculous attempt by republicans to overturn the will of the people of Pennsylvania in the 2020 general election.
trump's legal team is now 1-50.
Oh, and of the nine justices, there were zero dissenters. Not even trump's three appointees to the highest court in the land would come to his rescue.
Sadly, though, this nightmare is not over. Incredibly, the Texas AG --who is himself under federal indictment-- has filed what has got to be the most frivolous lawsuit in the history of lawsuits to the Supreme Court asking the Supremes to throw out the votes of millions of citizens in four other states. (And here I thought the republican party was the party of state's rights.) I always wonder how these lawyers filing these lawsuits are not sanctioned for these types of filings.
Rest assured that this case too shall be tossed, and Mr. trump will have to leave the White House after Joe Biden is sworn in. But, I'll give him credit, he is milking his long goodbye for as much as he can. He will continue fleecing his supporters out of their hard earned dollars until he has enough to pay for all his legal fees, and live comfortably ever after.
"These tremendous fundraising numbers show President Trump remains the leader and source of energy for the Republican Party and that his supporters are dedicated to fighting for the rightful, legal outcome of the 2020 general election," Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien said in a statement.
What he meant to say was this: These lawsuits are going nowhere, but these suckers who call themselves supporters continue to give us money so we will milk it for as long as we can.
There, fixed it for ya, Bill.
It's crazy how everyone has to cater to the feelings of these folks. The same folks who are out threatening elected officials with physical arm at their homes and declaring that they will wage an all out Civil War if trump is not declared the winner of the 2020 election.
This is all, of course, being encouraged by trump. The man who has shamefully refused to exit the stage after being trounced by over seven millions votes in the general election. trump's long shameful goodbye is getting worse every day, and his cult members and the spineless sycophants who masquerade as republican elected officials refuse to grow a pair and tell him that it's over.
Mr. trump is a loser, and the sooner he and his cut members realize that the better off we will me.
This is from Michael Tomasky writing for the Dailey Beast:
"So Tuesday is the day. December 8 is the “safe harbor” deadline by which all the states must resolve all election-related disputes. Then the electors vote next Monday, but that should be anti-climatic, because over the weekend, Biden was certified the winner in California, which gave him 279 electoral votes, and it doesn’t look right now as if electors are going to be replaced anywhere; the crazy-ass Republicans of Pennsylvania are up to something, but it looks like it’s mainly for show. So as of 5 p.m. Tuesday, it’ll basically be over.
He’ll try to pretend otherwise, even though it’s obvious to anyone with an IQ higher than the life expectancy in his beloved Russia that it’s all just a massive grift—a financial grift to get his bag-of-hammers-dumb supporters to pay off his debts, and a psychological grift of both his sucker admirers and the cowardly Republicans who know better but have the spines of amphibians and still won’t do something so basic as call Joe Biden the president-elect. (By the way, after Jan. 20, will they call him Mr. President? Sadly, this is a serious question.)
"Trump knows. He knows he is a historic loser. And he is in pain. He’s humiliated. And I’m overjoyed. I’ve never been big on schadenfreude, but this is one occasion when it’s absolutely called for. "
Yes, trump is a loser, but the biggest losers are the people who cuddled and enabled him all these years. They created this monster and now they have to live with the consequences. He has cannibalized the grand old party and there is no turning back from the MAGA invasion that has overrun them.
We all saw it coming, and we knew that it would come to this. We all hoped, though, that whatever damage he could do would be minimized with a resounding defeat at the ballot box. We were wrong. Losing the way he did has just made him worse. He is an even more grotesque character than he was before. He is man without shame or conscience, and he will continue his pathetic money grab and his Jim Jones style rallies until we stop paying attention to him.
Hopefully that will be a lot sooner than later.
Progressives and faux Socialists have been chirping a lot about Barack
Obama's declaration that the defund the police slogan was a bad idea. Well, I
hate to break it to them, but Obama was right.
No one in their right mind would think that defunding the police, or
even saying it in such a manner would appeal to the general public. Most people
view that as a cry to get rid of the police altogether, and that is the last thing that
people living in crime- ridden neighborhoods in cities like Philadelphia want
to do.
I, for one, am tired of these so called progressive left wingers and "woke" people who sit behind their ivory tower desks and in their air conditioned television studios, and then pontificate to us about how good Socialism and progressive policies are. (I see you Mark Lamont Hill and AOC) It's offensive. I was teaching in rural Jamaica as a part of Michael Manley’s National Youth Service program before some of them were even born. My Socialist bona fides is quite strong. I know a thing or two about Socialism, as I have lived it and studied it for a great part of my life.
Honestly, I consider myself more of a Socialist than anything else, because I happen to think that Socialism, in its purest form, is the best type of government for the majority of the people in the world. But I am also a realist, and I understand that you will never win elections in this country by being too far to what most Americans consider the left. The way you win the ideological battle is at the ballot box, and in order to do that you have to be smart politically. This means appealing to moderates in the middle and energizing your own base.
The faux Socialist out here calling for radical change know that it can’t be achieved in the voting process, And, let's keep it real, they damn sure aren’t going to take to the streets to start a revolution. That would mean having to give up their cushy lifestyles and making real sacrifices.
The only alternative is to win elections and effectuate change by implementing policies that are closer to our socialist principles without the scary catch phrases. And the only way we are going to do that is to be smart enough to get more votes than the other side.
To use a football and sports analogy: Don't give the other side bulletin board material to use against you. Be smart about what you are trying to do and how you are going to get there.
Remember, there are more than one ways to skin a cat. Or, for that matter, a turtle.
"To divide and rule could only tear us apart;
In everyman chest, mm - there beats a heart.
So soon we'll find out who is the real revolutionaries;
And I don't want my people to be tricked by mercenaries."
No mercenaries needed brother Bob. They are easily fooled by just about anything.
