How Democrats Should Campaign In 2024

The Democrats are going about campaigning on Joe Biden's behalf against Donald Trump in the most boneheaded way possible. Painting the latter as either too extreme or racist/sexist/xenophobic is surest way of ultimately losing in 2024.

Democrats need to start running on how much of a real do-nothing president Trump was while in office. They should run on how badly he mismanaged a once in a century disease pandemic and the devestation it'd caused. Just like they should be running upon how he gutted inner city spending, giving us all a crime wave (one which is on the waning end) not seen since the 1980s. Also like that partial government shutdown he caused from late 2018 to early 2019 that lasted for 5 straight weeks.

To put it another way, all the Democrats need to do is run entirely upon Trump's own record as president if they seek to win on November 5.

My Chief Complaint About Meta's Facebook Platform

Recently on my personal Facebook account, I've been getting numerous flipping friend requests from people who are friends of friends. While I personally have no issue on connecting with new people who want to be friends, I'm really uneasy about the rate of it. In my eyes, this is seriously out of control. I'll try to go through them, but it's too many to deal with all at once. Meta needs to implement some kind of mechanism that can do a mass acceptance or denial all at once.

Elon Musk Is Out Of Control On Twitter/X

Honestly, things are getting out of hand on Twitter/X. I can't stress this enough folks, Elon Musk is fully out of control. In his idiotic quest to silence the left is all very castingly a maneuver for so turning the platform into a hotbed for both supporting Donald Trump (yeah, he so is back on again) and promoting White Supremacy. Be it in this instance in elevating a known self-proclaimed "raging anti-Semite[sic][/Judeophobe]" Kevin Woods, the brain behind the hashtag #BanTheADL.

Just to be clear, the Anti-Defemation League does a lot of great work with trying to fight discrimination in just about any form. Yet this work has also earned the ADL some incredibly powerful detractors along the way. Per in many cases, rather said opposition sometimes comes from White Supremacy/Power extremists.

Like none of this is entirely new, but it's a real problem when figures like Musk elevate others like Woods. Just so without paying heedance to the corrosive effects. To fully see him doing this is a grave illustration of what's likely to come with next year's presidential election.

Trump is very likely to get elected in 2024, mostly due to some broader legal technicalities that would get him off the hook criminally wise, and he'll move to solidify the voices of hate's hold on what defines constitutional free speech.

I don't mean this as by what we say online, I mean it as by what may not be done for reining in any voices who threaten harm to us whenever we'd totally call out their venomous hatred out. Their flaming, utterly like in this instance might readily end up becoming reclassified as constitutionally protected free speech; even when legal precedent says otherwise.

Now, picture yourself as a kid at school, and right now you're so getting tortured both physically and mentally by your playyard bully. Yet upon the day you chose to fully stand up for yourself, you'd get expelled thus for even reporting them in the first place. But yet hang on a minute, don't think that that's the end with your bully triumphing as you take your walk of shame. All clearly with them jeering yet as each of your exteachers go off  in harsh repremands. See, all of this would truly be the tip of the iceberg here.

So like you see, that would be the environment we'd be thrown into. One where the voices of hatred can totally post, "N****r! N****r!", with the security of knowing that they'd completely get away with it. Moreover, just about any criticism of this practice, and/or of Trump et al., would thus be reclassified as both sedition and hate speech. Legitimacy in this instance so being irrelevant.

Essentially, this is all basically staging ground for mass intimidation. That of course being the setting for rather ostensibly effecting a full totalitarian dictatorship. Just as for how far this goes is anyone's guess, but it's fully now a question of how to check it before we're driven into a proverbial ditch.

Buckle up everyone, it'll be a bumpy ride.

Donald Trump's Federal Indictment Won't Change His Winning Trajectory

Even with former US President Donald Trump having been indicted for having stolen classified presidential records from the White House, it won't change his full trajectory to victory for the Republicans' presidential nomination and the presidency itself next year. Current US President Joe Biden, even while projecting broader confidence, isn't going to know what'd hit him and the Democratic Party writ-large to knock them well out of power so quickly. Part of the reason would be the total thining out of their base; as well as the Supreme Court gearing itself up to chuck out both the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 in their full entireties. By the close of 2023, these laws won't even be in effect any further.

The first priority for the Republicans upon taking total congressional control in January 2025 is to repeal both those aforementioned laws from the federal dockets so completely before even passing out tax cuts for the yet wealthiest American individuals and enterprises. Now the reason for doing it in that order is that it will utterly kill off a blue-colored wave election in 2026, and quite fully allow the GOP to continue imposing its will on us with complete impunity. It will also mean that Trump'll have the space he needs to change the Constitution just to his own benefit. His first target: that's the fuller 22^nd Amendment. Ditch that and he (or thus another family member) will be in office forever.

Quite thus then, everything's going to get worse before it gets better. For the faction trying to regain the power which it'd lost is the very same one that tore the whole country apart back during the American Civil War. So granted the issues aren't the very same as then, but yet the attitude and animosity absolutely are.

More specifically, the faction I'm so referring to is that of the old plantation owners, who today are yet mostly corporate titans. Its overtly racialized reactionism and total dedication to White Supremacy is what's broken now back into the mainstream again after being quite sidelined for a good nearly 70 years.

The Netanyahu Government Is Turning Israel Into An Apartheid State

It's gotten to a rather terrible point for Israel in the very sense that even some top members of its military brass are now calling the occupations of both the West Bank and East Jerusalem Apartheid after the territories have gotten placed under civilian control instead of the IDF. This would be especially true now that the government will now fully extend thorough legal recognition to all of the settlements, past, present, and future. Full while simultaneously defending any settler violence exacted upon resident any Palestinian families within the near vicinity.

Nevermind the fact that the Likud-led government thus is quite hellbent upon leading violent pogroms straight up on to all resident Palestinians living in the occupied territories. After finishing annexing the West Bank and East Jerusalem, Netanyahu and his cabinet would quite likely hone their sights right upon the Gaza Strip for its reannexation as well. Plus it's exceedingly well-known that doing all of that is a rather blatant contravention of international law, via the 4^th Geneva Convention along with several UNSC Resolutions, such as 242 and 465. Anything of this caliber has to be curbed immediately, otherwise we'll be looking at a potential bloodbath. Yet not solely on the Palestinian side, as Israeli lives would be lost as well.

No one, neither Jew nor Arab, deserves to be kept in as great of a deathful reprisal cycling as the one between Israel and Palestine. This has fully gone out of control as it is already, and can not continue in any measure.

Why Shaming Republican Candidates For Their Bigotry Won't Work

The Democrats and media are correct in calling out the unequivocally bigoted campaign rhetoric coming from numerous Republicans, but at this point, it's very moot. Now this is by many of these heads openly taking that shame, and turning it into a badge of honor. Some on the left have every incentive to pin this spike in hateful speech on Donald Trump, but they're thoroughly going after the wrong person.

Trump is the figure who's been blurting the quieter part of the Republican Party's numerous coded and bigoted tropes out loud, which had invariably marked a change in tone. But he's not the cause for all of this, especially not the direct one. That honor falls onto greater figures of yesteryear. These are people such as James Buckley and Robert Welch, both of whom had entirely opposed the ending of segregation and the onset of Civil Rights. Doing so starting right back in 1954 with the ruling of Brown v. Board. 

So for all this bigoted horseshit that Republicans have been saying on the campaign trail, it's a clear sign that the party so taking a chapter out of Trump's playbook. But at the same time, it's also a sign that all these new Dixiecans are picking up from where their Dixiecrat ancestors were stymied in the 1960s and 1970s. Trying to get rid of the Civil Rights laws which outlawed Jim Crow. All with its unremittingly mandated segregation and discrimination.

For Republicans, it's not so much about gaining power as a party, it's about a section of America seeking total revenge for what it determines as encroachment on its rights: the White South, specifically of its elites. Some members of this clique have a thoroughly long history of using such bellicose language whenever they don't get their way. To them, it's about preserving a power structure which can actually only run smoothly upon the suffering of non-Whites, especially Blacks. They and Hispanics/Latinos are overwhelmingly targetted for either their dark skin tones, or for speaking in the wrong language, or both. Bear in mind, this is only a small fraction of this group which we're talking about, not the overwhelming majority.

How Democratic Victory Will Be A False Positive In Terms Of 2024

 It's becoming more apparent as the Republicans' messaging falls apart due in part to Donald Trump having fully inserted himself into their primary process with the Big Lie, the Democrats are going to do very well in this Fall's midterm election. At least in respect to holding and even expanding their majorities in Congress. But don't be fooled, for 2024 is going to be a complete blood bath for the Democrats as the effects of the War in Ukraine and a very potentially worse outbreak of COVID-19 with a bungled response will lead to a Republican victory that year. What's worse is that the Dems don't have anybody to succeed Joe Biden if he ultimately chooses not to run that year. If he does choose to run, he's going to get clobbered real badly by whomever the Republicans field against him.

Russia Invading Ukraine Is A Dumb Move

For all the news banging around about Russia targetting Ukraine, no one should be all that surprised about an invasion. This happening was long in the making since 2014.

For Russia itself, this was a dumb move strategically as it's going encourage the growth of something it sought to cease: the further expansion of NATO. It'll kick into overdrive for 2 additional Scandanavian nations' push to join the alliance: Sweden and Finland. At the moment, these are neutral nations, but with actions going as they are, it'd be a non-surprise to see them clamoring to join.

Russia will come out of this in a worse position than when it in. America will use whatever leverage it has with Israel and China, which can cut the former out of the global trade and arms markets. Not only that, the war in Ukraine is exceedingly unpopular among the Russian people. The younger generations are getting information through social media sites like TikTok and Vkontakte rather than consuming the propoganda that's broadcasted on Russian state media.

Ordinary Russians are seeing the body bags that are coming back from Ukraine, and they're pissed off about it. They're beginning to protest against the war, which is scaring the living crap out of Vladimir Putin. As an autocrat, there's nothing more threatening than peaceful protests.

Donald Trump's Increasingly Violent Rhetoric Will Undermine Republicans In 2022

As the 2022 midterm election draws closer, the Republicans are looking less likely to retake Congress. The reason is simple, Donald Trump's increasingly violent rhetoric, which is leaving them dangerously exposed. One example is the recent pledge to pardon all participants in the attack on the Capitol on 01/06/2021. The message that sends is: Be as violent as possible for me and I'll ensure your lack of any accountability.

It's this rhetoric that is  worsening just about everyone's fury of our current system of both government and governance, albeit in the most misguided way possible. By continuing to sow doubt and chaos, Trump is still consistently sending (conscientiously/subconscientiously or not — a very interesting debate at that) overtures to some of the most violent White Supremacy and White Power extremists. He's signaling them that they should be ready to act upon his cue to snuff out any opposition by Americans at-large.

What this means for the Republicans is that their chances of victory on 11/08/2022 are slipping away from them due to the electorate being turned off by Trump's rhetoric. He's doing this by inserting himself as the sole focus of the party's campaign instead of President Joe Biden. Using this as a platform for lying about how 2020 was stolen from him, he's alienating the very swing voters who the party's desparately trying to court for the general election.

Trump is attempting to use the midterm campaign to exact revenge against those who voted to impeach him early last year, and continue to call for him to face any kind of accountability. That drive for exacting revenge in Republican primaries means that the party will field his handpicked extremists as their general election candidates, which will hurt the party itself in the end. This is a final result of the John Birch Society's newest reincarnation, the MAGA movement, taking over the Republican Party.

I'm Writing A Book

I know this is a stark departure from the overall theme of the blog. First off, I should probably apologize about my having gone so AWOL. The truth is I've been job hunting since the beginning of the year, and it's been eating up a lot of my time. I'm going to make it a priority to post more regularly for you all to have decent content.

Secondly, there's some news in terms of book writing. Okay, I'll first start this by answering the question of what the heck happened to the self-help book. That's on indefinite hiatus as I got writer's block with it. I'm currently stuck on page 10 with that one. The actual book writing news is of a new one I started writing in August. That one is currently on page 115. I'm almost at the half-way point with that one.

Kyrsten Sinema Is Seeking Joe Biden's Job

Kyrsten Sinema's gumming up the works on Joe Biden's agenda, while frustrating and/or infuriating, is not all that surprising by any stretch. The reason for her obstruction is glaringly obvious: she's aiming for Biden's job. That's right, Sinema wants to be president.

The fact is that Sinema is the last real dying breath of the corporatist New Democrats. Think about how much time she's been spending with big-dollar donors instead of working to pass legislation. These big-dollar donors include big business, trade groups, etc., and they want Biden's agenda killed as it's too closely aligned with that of congressional progressives.

Sinema is much easier to control by comparison as she's been a "Team Player" by moving the Democratic Party further to the right. Under her leadership, the Democratic Party becomes the oppositionary far-right party to Donald Trump and his lackeys in the Republican Party. When that happens all bets are off.

Donald Trump Will Be Elected President In 2024

A lot of people need to avoid falling into a false sense of confedence that Joe Biden, or whomever runs in his place on the Democratic national ticket, will be (re)elected in 2024. NO HE/THEY WON'T! Donald Trump will be "elected" (more like implanted) in 2024 instead.

Trump is going to become president through a combination of cheating from vote suppression and legislative undermining of popular will. We can fight this to the n^th degree, but it's not going to change the reality that Trump is going to win and by a bigger margin in the electoral college than he did in 2016; although with a smaller percentage of the popular vote. This is not so much minority rule as it is White Supremacist reign returning. Returning after a nearly 60-year hiatus.

Why It's Important For The Private Sector To Start Cracking Down To Get More People Vaccinated Against COVID-19

It's fairly easy to understand that no one wants any kind of government mandate for the public to get vaccinated here in America, as it would be decried as tyranny. That being said, there's nothing to say why the private sector can't be doing more to step up and bring this into play. In some cases it has, such as in San Francisco, where private businesses were pressing the city to require proof of vaccination in order to access their premises.

Other big companies, such as some airlines and big box stores are starting to mandate that their employees be vaccinated if they want to keep their jobs. This is good, as it will mean that the virus will have fewer bodies to spread to. The other main reason they're doing it is for the financial benefit it brings. The cost for treating unvaccinated employees is enormous. According to a report by the Kaiser Family Foundation, the average cost for treating the unvaccinated is $20,000.00 per individual. Since the private sector has no interest in paying that much for treating its workforce, it's in its interest to crack down on its workers. The more it does this, the more money it'll save we the taxpayers.

Here's the thing, employers are allowed to do this under federal law. No, it actually does not violate HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996) for them to do so, either; contrary to what some may think. Provided that their mandates don't discriminate on the basis of religious beliefs or underlying disabilities, it's 100% legal.

For customers, it's the same dynamic. It's also 100% legal for businesses to require their customers to show proof of vaccination in order to receive services. And as stated before, while the government can't directly make people get the vaccine or show proof of vaccination, the private sector can.

Joe Manchin Should Quit Wasting Time Negotiating With Republicans

I'll be fair to Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV) by highlighting his attempts at brokering some kind of bipartisan alternatives of the For The People Act & John Lewis Voting Rights Act with the Senate Republicans, but there comes a point where it becomes an exercise in futility. Mitch McConnell has signaled more than once that his conference won't negotiate at all. Their whole attention is set towards recapturing their lost trifacta in 2024, and the only way to do that is to set up the conditions for Donald Trump's comeback.

The Republicans are lining themselves up to shoot down Manchin's proposal despite its more modest approach than what was passed by the House of Representatives earlier this month. They're keenly aware of the effect the proposal will have on them in federal elections in 2022 and beyond.

Tell Your Republican Senator To Pass The Bill Creating A Commission For 1/6 Insurrection

 January 6 was the worst attack on our system of government since the Civil War, and we need to look into how it was allowed to happen. The Republicans' refusal to create a commission to look into the matter is a dereliction of duty on their end. The insurrection of that day had allowed a violent movement to become a bigger threat than it should have been. If you're living in a state that is represented by 1 or 2 Republicans in the Senate, contact them asap and threaten to forcibly retire them if they don't vote to pass the bill to create the commission charged with figuring out what the heck went wrong on 01/06/2021 with regards to Capitol security.

We Need To Pass The For The People Act

 The For the People Act is the best means of combating the Republicans' vote suppression schemes prior to the 2022 midterm and 2024 presidential elections, and it needs to pass as soon as possible. Besides putting the Republicans in their place, the act is also what America needs to maintain its democratic system of governance. Think about having a 232-year-old democratic system collapse and become a new normal of violence by a faction that's so hell-bent on suppressing your voices just to keep power. The thought of that is too terrifying to think of. If you live in a state/district represented by a Republican, call/email them, or hit them up on social media, and tell them to get behind the bill and pass it asap.

Donald Trump's Continued Hold On The Republican Party

It shouldn't be lost on anyone that Donald Trump us still pulling the strings behind the Republican Party's descent into fascism. This is why Republicans in Congress are fighting tooth and nail to ensure that no commission is set up for investigating the 01/06/2021 attack on the Capitol. Having the commission up and running means that some of them are likely going to be implicated in the attack's prior planning. It'll also illustrate that some figures in the Republicans' congressional leadership had also been in communication with then outgoing Trump about effectively executing the uprising.

Seeing both Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell squirm at the bill's passage in the House of Representatives indicates that they likely know something in how the attempted coup was allowed to happen in the first place. So be sure to watch this pair and their seconds-in-command in the coming days as these 2 are clearly trying to cover up any potential involvement of both themselves and anyone else in their respective conferences. They're also the gateway to Trump himself (who's doing everything he can think of to keep himself out of prison), who's leading the base to force those Republicans in power to be part of his cover up effort.

Don't think that Trump isn't aware of his deteriorating legal situation, or the fact that he's likely going to be in prison, because he definitely is. If a commission is set up by Congress to investigate the uprising of 01/06, it might illustrate his level of involvement in addition to the congressional Republicans' leadership's knowledge of the event's commencement and when they knew about it.

New Exploding War Between Israel & Palestine

This recent violence between Israel and the Palestinian paramilitary organization Hamas is very worrying. It's as if Benjamin Netanyahu and his extremist allies have found a new justification to eradicate the Palestinian people in their entirety. Before we get to that though, let's clear something up: Israel, like all nations, does have the right to defend itself against would-be aggressors. However, under Netanyahu's leadership, Israel's response has once again become overkill.

The goal looks to be collective punishment of the Palestinians for standing up to several illegal Israeli settler landgrabs in the 4-5 months prior to the recent outbreak in violence. Instead of blocking action on Israel's overreaction, America should put its foot down and tell it to end its landgrabs for good. This is what's fueling it, and Joe Biden, as America's president, has the clout to do so right now. He (Biden) shouldn't bother listening to AIPAC (which, for the record, is the domestic mouthpiece for Likud in America) with its lectures about how any criticism of Israeli policy is anti-Semitic/anti-Semitism. The 2 are not interrelated, despite what AIPAC says to the contrary. In fact, they're very different from each other.

The Palestinians need a voice at the table, and America would be in a position to facilitate that if it would quit buying into the lie that Israel is the aggrieved victim in this saga when it's very clear that it's the actual aggressor. It's also time for America to quit dragging its proverbial feet in engaging in some tough love on Israel; clearly laying out the law by saying that using the Holocaust to justify genocide and apartheid is wrong. This rings especially true given how modern Israel was born in the wake of the Nazis' nearly successful attempt to exterminate Europe's own Jewish population during WWII. It's not helping Israel's cause in becoming a non-pariah on the world stage.

Republicans Have Just Shot Themselves In The Foot

It's incredibly obvious that the Republican Party doesn't know what it's doing post-Trump, or where it's headed. The fact that the party is lashing out at its own elected officials is enough to demonstrate this point. That's especially true in Liz Cheney's case when House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy pushed her out of her leadership position as Conference chair.

Cheney has been doing America a real service by not going along with the Republican lie that Joe Biden stole the election from Donald Trump last year. However, we can't lose sight of the fact that her father, ex-Vice President Dick Cheney, had a hand in creating the conditions that allowed his (Trump's) presidency to happen in the first place.

By sidelining the "reasonable" voices in their ranks, the Republicans are alienating moderate voters whose votes they'll need if they want to regain congressional control (full or partial) in next year's midterm election. And at the rate they're going racing towards MAGA-world, that's unlikely to happen. Centrist voters understand what MAGA is now, and they want none of it.

Why Neo-McCarthyism And Russophobia Are Still Threats To Watch Out For

Neo-McCarthyism is still a problem in this day and age, especially when we start calling those who disagree with us Russian puppets. Look, America was founded on the principle that we don't all have to agree on everything, and that our political discourse is the contest of ideas and their effective implementation. But in all honesty though, we need to not be calling each other Russian puppets and bots. And I still think in this day and age that it's incredibly dangerous to be bashing Russia for political advantage. Doing this plays to the narrators who say that Russia is the cause of our problems and that it should be wiped off the face of the map; that it's the very existential threat to our way of life. 

First off, that premise is so laughably false on its own merits. Here's how: Russia doesn't have anything to gain from antagonizing us, or our allies; nor does it have anything to gain from breaking America up. The Russians are not stupid, they understand full well that the breakup of America would bring a level of chaos that is substantially bigger than what their nation went through following the Soviet Union's breakup in 1991.

Secondly, what do the Russians have to gain by trying to remake our country in their image? Nothing, other than making the point that if we don't want them interfering in our domestic politics, don't do so in theirs. If you think about it, it has credence. They understand full well that trying to remake us in their own image won't get them anywhere as they've tried doing it without any success. To russify us is an exercise in futility, just like it is for us with americanizing them.

Finally, the Russians understand that atagonizing us is a dangerous game for them to play. They know full well what we'll do in retaliation and that we can pull off a retaliatory strike much faster than they can. The Russians are aware of the fact that not only will we hit back faster and harder, we'll also go the extra step of forcibly pacifiying them by remaking them in our image. How do they know this? Our doing so with Japan at the conclusion of WWII. When we did this with the Japanese, we went the extra step of creating a constitution that prohibits them waging war unless it's done in self-defense. For the Russians this would be the ultimate catastrophy as they'll have to deal with the humiliation of being occupied by a foreign power while they're being rebuilt.

In terms of the neo-McCarthyists, we need to make clear to them that they don't get the only say in how we conduct our relations with the Russians or how we're supposed to view them. If anything, their anti-Russia hysteria will only breed a return of occasionally violent russophobia (fear or hatred of Russians as a people). And yeah, it's happened during the red scares of the early-to-mid 20th Century.

I can tell you from first-hand knowledge from dating a Russian lady, most of them are not mean and/or violent brutes with no manners or morals. Most of them are actually very friendly and willing to help you out when you need it. Can they get aggressive? Sure, but that's only when you spook them or piss them off. If anything, they're loyal to a fault. As for manners, they have them, they're just somewhat different from what we think of them as. For example, and this is no joke, the phrase "Feed me" to Russians is a polite request. Honesty is generally not an issue as they're people who will tell it as it is. Like us, they consider directness to be a display of honesty. Last of all, no, most Russian girls and women are not sex kittens! Russians for the most part stick to the traditional view that sex out of wedlock is immoral and reflects poorly on the family as a whole.

I can keep going on with that mini-side lecture, but the point is that they're not like they're made out to be. The next time you hear someone spouting off russophobic comments, take that as a sign that they don't know anyone who's Russian or that they've never been around Russians.