They just want their patriarchy back

I finished the book The Novel by James Michener. Yeah, it’s a novel about novels. More accurately it is a novel about the people who bring books into existence. I’ve read several of Michener’s novels that explore the history of a place and I enjoy them. I saw this one at a used book fair and was intrigued by it. Much of the story takes place in Pennsylvania Dutch country between Allentown and Philadelphia. In this area “Dutch” doesn’t refer to people whose ancestors came from the Netherlands. This “Dutch” is a simplified spelling of “Dietch” or “Deutch” and refers to Germany. When they came to America (invited by William Penn himself) they were in two groups, the Amish who rejected all modern conveniences and the Mennonite who rejected only a few. Much of this story is in the Mennonite community and is set in 1991. At the start Lukas Yoder is finishing up his eighth novel set in his community. The first four didn’t sell well, the next three were best sellers. So there’s a lot riding on this one. We see what happens when a story is finished. He travels to New York City to talk to his editor and agent. There are comments by the editor about what needs to be fixed and he spends days fixing them. Various media want to write features about him. Movie producers want to talk to him about rights to a previous book. He gets lots of fan mail. The second section is about the editor, Yvonne Marmelle, how she came to love books and how she got to be an editor. I didn’t realize, though it makes sense, there are New York colleges that have classes in how to edit. Marmelle rises through the ranks of editing, from the slush pile (Mound Dreck) to having considerable influence with the bosses. Her duties include guiding the author to making the best book possible. In the background are threats that her company might be sold to a conglomerate. There is a lover who has a great idea for a book but can’t actually finish it. The third and longest section is about the critic, Karl Streibert. He grew up in the area and attended the local Mecklenberg College. He and his mentor discuss the nature of novels, some of which is shared with the reader. Are novels for everyone or are they the means for one elite to communicate to another about how to guide society? Should a novel focus on the state of the society as it is now? They agree a novel isn’t about grand ideas, it should be about how characters interact with grand ideas. Streibert ends up teaching at Mecklenberg and Marmelle wants him to write a book of criticism. He wants to include a review of Yoder, who he considers a hack with little to say, but Marmelle won’t let him savage another of her clients. Streibert’s students include Timothy and Jenny, who are on their way of being novelists. The final section is about Jane Gardner, Timothy’s grandmother and a local. She is a devoted reader, the kind of person authors love. On the walls of Streibert’s classroom he has a genealogy chart of the ancient Greek House of Atreus. He hands students a list of 21 people in the chart and how they interacted with each other (usually murder of some sort). His point is a great deal of Western storytelling descends from the stories of this family. Dartagnan of the Daily Kos community wrote about the plot to turn women against birth control. As with many efforts like this it is based on lies. The claim is the pills are harmful, though they’ve been used since 1960 with only a small number experiencing side effects. The pill is also safer than pregnancy. The pill has revolutionized female life – maternal and infant health have improved dramatically and death rates have plummeted. Women are able to fill roles in education, professions, and politics. Those pushing a ban on contraception aren’t as quiet about their real goals as they have been in the past. Part of that is because the current Supreme Court, especially Justice Thomas, have invited cases that could lead to banning contraception. One might think that people who want to ban abortion would welcome contraception as a way to reduce the number of pregnancies and thus the number of abortions. But they’re just as much against contraception as abortion.

But their thorough analysis doesn’t quite capture the element of perverse misogyny at work in this crusade to demonize something that has proved effective—and transformative of women's role in our society—for over 70 years. The very people who brought about Dobbs and eliminated many women’s option to terminate unwanted pregnancies are the same people who are now targeting contraception. Their end goal is to control female sexual behavior so that pregnancy cannot be prevented (except by complete abstinence). Should anyone actually become pregnant, the goal is to provide no recourse, under any circumstances. In reality that’s not a plan at all, but a punishment. This is what [right-wing influencer and podcaster Matt] Walsh and others really mean by “women fully embracing their own womanhood.” It’s what ultimately underlies the right’s unrelenting obsession with women’s bodies and what they do with them. It envisions turning back the clock on all women's progress over the past century and instead reimposing a regime where every person’s potential is irreversibly tied to their sex or gender, with men running things and women in a subservient, childbearing role. In other words: They don’t really care about women’s health. They just want their patriarchy back.

Mark Sumner of Kos discussed oral arguments at the Supreme Court on the challenge to the abortion drug mifepristone. Most of the justices are skeptical of the doctors who brought the case, mostly because the doctors don’t have standing – they couldn’t explain how they were harmed by the availability of the drug. So taking the drug off the market is unlikely.

However, both Justice Samuel Alito and Justice Clarence Thomas made sure to leave a trail of legal breadcrumbs hinting at a way for conservatives to not just prevent women from having access to mifepristone, but possibly enact a total national ban on abortion. “This is a prominent provision,” said Alito. “It's not some obscure subsection of a complicated obscure law.” The law he was referring to is the Comstock Act, an 1873 law against obscenity that has rarely been enforced over the past century and is generally remembered in the same breath as Prohibition, a misguided attempt to legislate morality that’s been dead for close to a century. But for conservatives, this porn law from the Victorian Age really isn’t obscure. It’s the foundation for their next big assault on reproductive rights.

The parts of the Comstock Act dealing with contraception have been repealed. The rest has been ignored. The parts on abortion are still on the books, though Roe made them inactive. So if Alito and Thomas are allowed to get their hands on it Republicans in Congress wouldn’t have to enact a national abortion ban. Joan McCarter of Kos also wrote about the mifepristone hearing at the Supremes and that the drug is likely safe for now. She also mentioned the Comstock Act. The big issue she presents is that the effort to get another abortion case before Alito and Thomas is led by “dark-money overlord Leonard Leo, the architect of the conservative court.” So why aren’t Democrats working to stop him? In particular, Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin and his committee have authorized subpoenas for Leo and Court sugar daddy Harlan Crow to testify before them. But months later the subpoenas haven’t been issued. Though Durban still criticizes the lack of ethics on the Court he isn’t doing this one thing to highlight the lack of ethics. Yesterday I wrote about conservatives blaming the Baltimore bridge collapse on DEI programs. John Stoehr, editor of the Editorial Board, discusses that action. Blaming something bad on marginalized people they dislike is highly predictable behavior of those on the far right. Pat Robertson did it when blaming gay people for hurricanes (what, hurricanes will stop if gay people disappear?).

The lyrics are different, but the song is the same. These days, the rightwing fringe is obsessed with something called DEI (or diversity, equity and inclusion programming). You don’t need to know much about DEI except that it’s a good-faith effort to make society fairer. Anyone with a sense of decency wouldn’t blink of an eye at that, but rightwingers don’t see fairness as fairness. They see it as theft. So whenever bad things happen, they are quick to blame Black people.

So why should we care about what they say. Even sounding stupid doesn’t stop them. A fact checker didn’t stop the nasty guy from lying.

All we need to know is how to recognize a malicious pattern – they already hate marginalized people and will exploit accidents, natural disasters, practically any bad thing that has ever happened to justify hating them and disseminating that hate. Don’t get me wrong. DEI, and any good-faith effort to make society fairer, is worth defending. But let’s not confuse defense with offense. Let’s not confuse setting the record straight with political victory.

A couple cartoons just for the fun of it. They’re in the comments of a pundit roundup on Kos. The first is from Nay Cartoons. Jesus is in the barber chair and the barber, trying to make small talk, says, “Any special plans for Easter?” Ellis Rosen posted a cartoon showing a sea captain at the wheel of his ship talking to his first mate, saying, “A storm rages from the East – tell the men to get below and snuggle up for movie night.”

Where billionaires replace barons and run their kingdoms as they see fit

I wish I didn’t need to write about the nasty guy. Well, yeah, I could just ignore him. So I wish he wasn’t doing stuff that prompts me to write about him. I would appreciate if he just ... disappeared. Mark Sumner of Daily Kos wrote the nasty guy has, in some ways, been acting like he’s still in the Oval Office. He effectively vetoed the border security bill. He held a pseudo state dinner with Hungarian despot Viktor Orbán. And he has his own diplomat in Richard Grenell. On behalf of the nasty guy Grenell meddled in Gruatemala, trying to get an election overturned. In Kosovo and Serbia he worked to undermine the official US diplomacy and damage a peace deal. He was part of why Turkey took so long to approve Sweden for membership in NATO. It got to the point where there were questions whether Grenell violated the Logan Act, which forbids private citizens from undermining US diplomatic efforts. Aldous Pennyfarthing of Kos wrote that investors in the nasty guy projects or companies usually get burned. Many of his companies have gone bankrupt. He has a strong tendency not to pay people. And people can run afoul of the law because of some of the illegal things he’s done (contesting the 2020 election has ruined many careers, such as that of My Pillow Guy Mike Lindell). So when the nasty guy’s Truth Social went public earlier this week why did so many people think it would be different this time? I’m pleased to see that, as Sumner reported, many actual Christians (people who actually do what Jesus says to do) are aghast and appalled over the nasty guy hawking a Bible. They call it a desecration, blasphemy, and offensive. I heard in all the conservative blaming over the collapse of the Baltimore bridge there were voices saying there must be – somewhere – a diversity, equity, and inclusion program that caused this mess. Maybe it was the ship’s crew, or the port crew that loaded the vessel, or maybe a DEI program somewhere else. In a large cartoon for Kos Ruben Bolling, as part of his Tom the Dancing Bug series, he says that DEI really means, “Demographically Entitled Idiots.” They ruin cultural institutions with unearned privilege and incompetence. They glide into important positions and fail upwards.

Who hasn’t boarded a plane, seen a straight white male pilot, and thought, “Oh, no! I bet he coasted into this job without any true talent or expertise!” We must get rid of D.E.I. principles, and let people whose merits and mettle were put to the test, overcoming poverty, discrimination, and/or systemic barriers, rise through true achievement!

In a pundit roundup for Kos Greg Dworkin quoted an article on Axios that discussed the religious undertones of the nasty guy rallies have grown more apocalyptic and messianic. The bottom line is that...

64% of Republicans view Trump as "a man of faith," according to a November poll by Deseret News — more than his former vice president and vocal evangelical Mike Pence.

In the comments are a few good memes. One posted by Captain Frogbert shows on one side check marks beside “Greed, Lust, Wrath, Vanity, Envy, Gluttony, and Sloth.” The other side shows these words crossed out, “Charity, Faithfulness, Mercy, Humility, Kindness, Self Control, and Diligence.” Across the bottom is “All sin, no virtue.” Below that Frogbert wrote:

Let’s face it. Trump exhibits NONE of the behavior expected of good or decent men. That so called “christians” could literally WORSHIP him is a testament to how corrupted and false their faith has become. They have been twisted and perverted by false prophets and grifters masquerading as “pastors” of their megachurches and television evangelism shows.

One posted by exlrrp: “A true Billionaire Christian would be donating Bibles, not selling them.” To that one I reply a true Christian wouldn’t exploit his employees and suppliers to become a billionaire. Bill in Portland, Maine, in his Cheers and Jeers column for Kos, quoted late night commentary:

"Look, of course America's infrastructure is in need of updating. But I don’t think this is the proof. Falling down is kinda what you expect a bridge to do when a giant cargo ship slams into it. If your grandma gets body-slammed by The Rock, you're not gonna blame her broken bones on a calcium deficiency." —The Daily Show's Jordan Klepper, on right-wing fearmongers blaming the bridge collapse on "whatever is most convenient to them." "Trump selling the Bible? That's like if Mike Pence was selling copies of Fifty Shades of Grey." —Jimmy Fallon Happy Holy Week, Donald. Instead of selling Bibles, you should probably buy one. And read it, including Exodus 20:14. —Liz Cheney

I looked up Exodus 20:14 – “You shall not commit adultery.” Ronna McDaniel, fresh from being booted from the chair of the Republican National Committee was offered a job as an NBC News Contributor. She made it on air once. Then the pushback from the rest of the newsroom prompted NBC News to fire her. Sumner reported that NBC journalists knew that a paid pundit who supported overthrowing the government and ending democracy was a red line.

It wasn’t just the long and excellent tirade from skilled commentator Rachel Maddow (though Maddow’s willingness to absolutely go there certainly made any thought of McDaniel making another on-air appearance seem ludicrous).

It was also Chuck Todd of Meet the Press.

Taking their grievance over McDaniel’s hiring and making public, on-air statements that were 180 degrees opposed to their management was an act of journalistic bravery by Todd, Maddow, and others. That brave act was also largely enabled by the name recognition and status that both Todd and Maddow enjoy. Had either of them sat quietly, it’s not clear how many others would have been able to stand up.

In an article posted at the end of January Sumner discussed the state of news. He titled it No news is terrible news. A lot of media companies are cutting staff or going out of business.

The biggest reason is simple: Ad revenue is no longer adequate to support news organizations. But the deeper reason behind that decline is elusive and while everyone scrambles to find some alternative, lights are shutting off in newsrooms across the nation. If “Democracy dies in darkness,” as The Washington Post’s motto insists, it’s starting to look pretty dim out there. And nightfall may not be far away.

It isn’t that people aren’t buying the physical paper and switching to reading online. Those readers have gone away. There are two exceptions: local broadcast stations whose revenues have been flat, and Fox News, which isn’t trusted as a news source except by its base. Because so many large media companies have folded luring investors is difficult. Unless one is Musk, Murdoch, or Bezos, who can buy a media company without worrying about profit. That also means their news is suspect.

If you want a glimpse of the feudal society ahead, where billionaires replace barons and run their kingdoms as they see fit, news outlets provide a pretty good sneak peek. At a time when the United States is facing an enormous crisis in just trying to hold on to representative democracy and there may be more news than ever that absolutely demands to be reported, the resources to do that reporting are disappearing. ... The online space was supposed to democratize news. But actual news—collected, analyzed, and written by human beings—requires resources. The precipitous drop in ad revenues has made those resources thin on the ground. How this crisis will be solved remains unclear and it’s far from certain that it will be solved.

100,000 tons of mass doesn't "bump" anything

I’ve been thinking about the bridge collapse in Baltimore that happened a couple days ago. I didn’t say anything before because I thought it was well covered in the news. However, there are a couple things about it that have caught my interest. First, when the ship lost power and steering they told people on shore immediately. That gave police enough time to stop traffic, but alas not enough time to warn the repair crew on the bridge. That’s why there are six dead and not dozens to hundreds. I wouldn’t want to be in the cars on the bridge approach, stopped by police, then feel the shudder and watch the bridge I’m waiting to cross suddenly disappear. There would be a mix of emotions of annoyance that I’d now have to take the long way home along with extreme thankfulness that the police car blocked my way. The second thing of interest is the collapse. I watched the video and that bridge went down in ten seconds. That video is, I’m sure, available online. There are now lots of photos of the ship with bridge wreckage across its nose (as in the photo at the top of this post). I realized the ship didn’t bump the bridge support, it destroyed it. There is no bridge support in the photo. That’s why the roadway collapsed. RustyRobot of the Daily Kos community revels in big ships like the Dali that crashed into the bridge. There is a previous photo of the Dali at the top of his post with a lot fewer shipping containers than it has now. This post includes a lot of stats on the ship and a description of the engine, which is a huge thing. Emily LeCoz and Trevor Hughes of USA Today reported on tugboats used to get the big ships into port. Well, not so much anymore because many big ones have their own maneuvering engines. In this case the tugs pulled away before the ship lost power and could have prevented the collapse. The article also talks about the huge size of these ships. The earliest container ships, the ones from the 1980s, could hold 4,300 containers. Modern ones can hold five times that, the largest holding 24,346 containers. The Dali, as loaded now, is estimated to weigh 100,000 tons. That amount of mass hitting a bridge support is going to destroy that support. The ship is now likely snagged on the underwater remains of the support. Today’s news said that two more of the bridge repair crew were recovered from the water. They were inside their truck. Four are still missing and authorities believe they and their vehicle is tangled in the bridge wreckage and can’t be recovered until the wreckage can be pulled up. The next step is to get a crane on a barge beside the Dali and begin to unload it. One is to arrive tonight. Some of the containers contain hazardous materials. That first link above (repeated here) is to a pundit roundup for Kos by Chitown Kev. He adds the closure of the Baltimore harbor to other world wide shipping hassles – low water in the Panama Canal, reducing throughput, and Houthis attacking ships heading for the Suez Canal. Then Kev quoted an article about the conspiracy theories popping up around the bridge collapse and the long list of culprits conspiracists are trying to blame. Then on to... Charles Blow of the New York Times discussed the continued attack on black women even after the departure of President Gay. The attacks are led by Christopher Rufo, “a right-wing provocateur and instigator.” Blow wrote:

This is, after all, part of Rufo’s plan, having announced, “Game on,” after helping to push out Gay. The veracity of the complaints doesn’t matter; the reputational harm — to the accused and to the idea of inclusion — is the goal. The narrative here is about innate and pervasive inferiority, ineptitude and fraudulence by women and minorities, specifically Black women in this case. And it must be understood that the subtext, the inverse, of minority inferiority is therefore white supremacy.

Kev also quoted Ken Chitwood writing for Sojourner’s reporting that evangelicals are looking for their pastors to preach sermons on the politics of immigration. There are a lot of verses about being kind to the foreigner and the traveler. There are sites that have gathered those appropriate verses together (Kev has a link to list for the King James Bible). Anton Troianovski and Milana Mazaeva of the NYT wrote that Putin has another problem on his hands after the concert hall attack. Though Putin blames Ukraine (without evidence) the attackers were from the predominantly Muslim Central Asian country of Tajikistan. That is stoking lots of anti-migrant and anti-Muslim rhetoric online.

For Mr. Putin, the problem is magnified by the competing priorities of his war in Ukraine. Members of Muslim minority groups make up a significant share of the Russian soldiers fighting and dying. Migrants from Central Asia are providing much of the labor that keeps Russia’s economy running and its military supply chain humming. But many of the most fervent supporters of Mr. Putin’s invasion are Russian nationalists whose popular, pro-war blogs on the Telegram messaging app have brimmed with xenophobia in the days since the attack.

On to the cartoons in the comments. Clay Jones shows two elephants in a car falling from a broken bridge. One says, “If anyone asks... We voted for the infrastructure bill.” A cartoon from John Buss suggests a companion to the gold sneakers and nasty guy Bible is a nasty guy gold plated crucifix, which has his image instead of Jesus. One can supposedly find it at Trumpcrucifixation.com. One posted by Swankie Frankie shows the nasty guy in a prison yard with the caption “The wall that will ‘Make America Safe Again.’ ” I had written that I didn’t care who Robert F. Kennedy Jr. chose for his vice presidential candidate. I still don’t, though there are a couple things related to the choice that are worth mentioning. The first is by Mark Sumner of Kos. It seems Kennedy’s biggest criteria for his partner is that Nicole Shanahan is rich, as in billions rich. That’s important because a candidate can donate as much as they want from their personal funds, where other donors have limits. On the downside, she’s only 38 and she has no experience in government. Also, her billions, if she donates that much, won’t turn Kennedy into a winning candidate. He can only be a spoiler. The other thing was reported by Marisa Lagos of NPR. She played a clip from one of Shanahan’s speeches. One sentence sounds pretty good and has implied references to the tobacco industry and Big Oil’s reports on climate change.

We have to rid science of the corporate bias that contaminates it today.

Except the “corporate bias” she wants to eliminate is that vaccines are good. And...

LAGOS: “But by playing on people's doubts about institutions, she is sending a clear signal to those who already believe those conspiracies, says Yotam Ophir, a professor at the University at Buffalo who studies misinformation.” ... OPHIR: Conspiracy theorists always use a grain of truth, a kernel of truth, to kind of support their claims. That's what makes those stories so compelling. LAGOS: He says it's all part of a populist playbook in which people who already have power present themselves as outsiders who can fix things in order to gain more power.

Lagos also talked to Mike Madrid, who is a Republican Political Consultant (so keep some skepticism). Madrid said the national division isn’t so much right against left, but...

We have to start talking about establishment versus populism, outsiders versus insiders, people who are looking to just kind of break down institutions and use institutions as a target to say, this is what ails us.

And a populist could attract enough votes in swing states to swing the election. A while back, during a cold snap, I lamented my forsythia would not bloom. But the cold ended and today was sunny and pleasant – high about 50F (10C). And the forsythia has done all right. Not every one of the little blooms opened, but enough did that they look pretty decent. Here are a couple photos, first from my biggest shrub.

And from the shrub that I thought least likely to bloom this year.

Good enough! I now have my annual clouds of yellow out of most of my side and back windows. A few years ago I wrote (and I’m not digging up the post) that we should work hard to lessen the effects of climate change for the sake of chocolate. This half-minute report was on NPR this morning:

Good morning. I'm Debbie Elliott. Cocoa prices have hit all-time highs. Producers say poor crop yields in the face of climate change in West Africa, where 70% of the world's cocoa supply is grown, is to blame. Some chocolate makers are raising prices, while others are shrinking their candies. Even Easter can have a Grinch. It's MORNING EDITION.

Claiming the last area the middle class has to build wealth

Dartagnan of the Daily Kos community discussed how abortion bans affect standard pregnancy care. The reason is simple: Doctors are scared some aspects of formerly routine care, especially around miscarriage, will be interpreted as assisting abortion.

The stakes are no longer limited to the “debate” about abortion itself, but now to implicate the health care of anyone, anywhere, experiencing any type of pregnancy.

Walter Einenkel of Kos discussed Jon Stewart of The Daily Show explaining the nasty guy’s civil fraud trial (the one where the amount he needed to post before appeal was just reduced). The whole case is because the nasty guy lied. He did so frequently in his business deals. Conservative media pundits have been saying this is a victimless crime. The banks were repaid, so no harm done. But the bank was paid less than they would have if the nasty guy was honest. And the money loaned to him wasn’t loaned to someone more honest. And the “everybody does it and no one is caught” excuse isn’t allowed – by many of the same people who excuse the nasty guy – for those who commit fraud in the SNAP food program. The nasty guy lying on business forms isn’t any more victimless than Justice Clarence Thomas receiving “gifts” from billionaires. Though in the case of Thomas the victim is usually democracy. In a pundit roundup for Kos Chitown Kev quoted Paul Krugman of the New York Times, who discussed the success of Obamacare (coming up to 10 years of full implementation) and a renewed effort by Republicans to kill it.

So the reality of Obamacare’s success won’t deter Republicans who want to destroy it. If anything, the law’s success only increases their determination to kill it, because it shows that, contrary to their ideology, government actually can make Americans’ lives better.

Down in the comments is a cartoon by Randy Bish showing two guys pausing for coffee. One says to the other, “It amazes me how any person with over 90 felony counts against them can keep a straight face while telling people that they are the victim.” Dave Whamond posted a cartoon. A mother says, “My child was killed in a mass shooting!” The nasty guy responds, “Get over it!” Then the nasty guy says, “I’m a victim! I’ve been unjustly persecuted! Nobody has been mistreated as badly as me!” The mother replies, “Get over it!” Earlier this month Clay Jones posted a cartoon on Kos. It shows Justice John Roberts talking to the rest of his Supreme Court colleagues after they ruled that states cannot bar a candidate from the ballot because he committed insurrection and while they are considering whether the nasty guy has immunity from prosecution. The cartoon has Roberts saying, “Voters should be able to choose an insurrectionist while not knowing if he’s a convicted felon.” From mid month a cartoon by Mike Luckovich shows Putin saying, “I grabbed him by the presidency. When you’re a dictator, he lets you do it...” To decide what to write about today I went through old browser tabs. In many of them I decided nah, I don’t want to write about that. Here’s one I found from mid February and thought it worth writing about. It is by SemDem of the Kos community. This writer was annoyed with relatives supporting Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for president. Reports from today say he has chosen his vice president (I really don’t care who) because some states say the VP must be named before he can get on the ballot. The relatives support RFK Jr., though he is caught up in vaccine conspiracies, because he talked about housing affordability and the nasty guy and Biden have said little to none. Kennedy mentioned a big reason why young people have troubles buying houses. Giant corporations are buying up houses and turning them into rentals. They can, when they want to, outbid anyone else trying for the same house. By 2030 corporations may control 40% of single-family rental homes. SemDem wrote, “It truly does appear that the billionaire class really wants to claim the last remaining area the middle class has left to build wealth.” Kennedy has been gaining support because he is campaigning through social media and at college campuses. And by focusing on houses he has a topic of high interest to younger voters. Yes, Biden has mentioned housing and has a plan. But much of what he wants to do is dependent on a Congress vying for how little they can accomplish. SemDem mentions some of Biden’s efforts and efforts of other people. Loosen zoning laws so neighborhoods don’t have to be filled with single family houses to allow more people to fit on available land. Convert office space (a big surplus of that now) to apartments. When Sister visited at Christmas I shared a bit of background on Elon Musk, which explained a lot of things to Sister. What I said was that Musk was raised in South Africa and was quite upset that whites lost their top spot in society and could no longer enforce rules on the black population. Nancy Groutsis of the Kos community read the biography of Musk by Walter Isaacson and pulled out a few things. She said Musk was born and completely immersed in South Africa’s white racist culture until he moved to Canada in 1989. Then she explained what Apartheid culture was like. On NPR Jason DeRose talked about religious churn, people switching faith traditions or leaving religion. Surveys show that about a quarter of Americans identify as religiously unaffiliated. High in departures is the Catholic Church with fewer Protestants leaving. The fewest departures are by black Protestants and Jews. Of those who left nearly half said it was because of negative teaching and treatment of LGBTQ people.

"Religion's negative teaching about LGBTQ people are driving younger Americans to leave church," [Public Religion Research Institute chief executive Melissa] Deckman says. "We found that about 60% of Americans who are under the age of 30 who have left religion say they left because of their religious traditions teaching, which is a much higher rate than for older Americans." ... About one-third of religiously unaffiliated Americans say they no longer identify with their childhood religion because the religion was bad for their mental health. That response was strongest among LGBTQ respondents.

Other reasons for departures: clergy sex abuse and over-involvement in politics. I’m getting close to finishing my taxes. My printer will be cranking out a stack of forms and I hope to have them in the mail by early next week. I’ve been checking the little box that directs $3 to the presidential election campaign fund. This pays candidates so they don’t have to raise so much corporate cash and be as beholden to corporate interests. Just Saying of the Kos community wrote this year one of those candidates is the nasty guy and this federal money given to his campaign will be used to pay his legal bills. So this is a year not to check that box (and to verify your tax software or preparer didn’t check it for you). Perhaps send a donation directly to Biden instead.

A series of nested grifts

I watched the Young Royals conclusion. This is the story of Wilhelm, Prince of Sweden, falling in love with Simon while at a boarding school. This episode was the longest, almost an hour, so the whole series, 18 episodes, was about 14 hours of story. Through this third season I thought about how this might end. Simon could be designated prince consort and become part of the royal family. Simon could decide he could never fit in with the royal family and say goodbye to Wilhelm. Or Wilhelm could give up royalty and go with Simon. At the end of episode 5, after Wilhelm blows up with his parents, Simon said he couldn’t take it anymore and wanted out. So the middle option seemed likely. In this episode Simon clarified he couldn’t take the royalty anymore. Back when season 1 was released (and long before I saw it and long before season 2 was considered), Edvin Ryding, the actor playing Wilhelm, was on NPR. Part of what he said is if a gay prince takes the throne there will be no heirs. They dynasty ends. Either the monarchy also ends or the next monarch comes from another line of the family. Beyond that I’m not going to say how the story ends. There are a couple more things to mention. How old must one be to drink alcohol in Sweden? The last episode showed that Wilhelm just turned 17. Yet at a party in this episode (as was the case in other episodes) there was a great deal of drinking by the students, with permission from the adults. One side story was the friendship between Simon’s sister Sara and Felice. I began to wonder if this was going to develop into lesbian love. Then Sara became girlfriend to August. Then she betrayed August because he betrayed Wilhelm. So Sara is available again. At the party in this episode one of August’s classmates admits to the guys he’s gay. The guys offer to help him lose his virginity. I enjoyed this series and recommend it. It’s a good story. And it is a good queer positive show. We need as many of those as we can get. I see Netflix also has a feature Young Royals Forever, which appears to be a behind the scenes documentary. I’ll save it for the weekend. Hunter of Daily Kos reported that the nasty guy’s Truth Social knockoff of X (formerly Twitter) went public yesterday. It’s a complicated corporate scheme that got it onto a stock market quickly. Once there the nasty guy’s base gobbled up the stocks and the price soared. This is a company that has never made a profit – it lost more than $45 million in the first 9 months of 2023. There is no reason to think profits would be coming. Yet, the company’s value – share price times number of shares – climbed above $5.7 billion (The next article said it reached $7 billion). Since the nasty guy owns 60% of the shares his net worth just jumped $4 billion and put him in the world’s 500 richest people. Institutions, which usually handle and benefit from initial public offerings, appear to be avoiding this one. Also no sign of Saudi royalty or Russian oligarchs. Which means this is driven by the base. The nasty guy isn’t allowed to sell his portion for six months – unless he gets permission from the company’s board. I hear his sons are on that board. He’s got expensive legal bills and about $175 million due soon. So it would not at all surprising he dumps a bunch of his shares, which crashes the price of the stock. Which means he could suck a few billion out of the wallets of his supporters. Liz Dye of Public Notice wrote: “As with everything Trump does, this entire thing appears to be a series of nested grifts.” That grift isn’t your style? Try this one. Hunter also reported the nasty guy is promoting the sale of a Bible. Considering how unchristian he acts that right there is a laugh. But this is not just any Bible.

Does your Bible include a “Handwritten chorus to ‘God Bless The USA’ by Lee Greenwood”? Does your Bible also fill out a few more pages by providing full copies of the notably public domain U.S. Constitution and Declaration of Independence? No? It doesn't? Well, then, you're probably going straight to hell, because Jesus isn't going to put up with you carrying around a Bible that doesn't have those things.

This is put out by GodBlessTheUSABible.com. And appears to be independent of the nasty guy’s corporations. The only connection is he is being paid (I’m sure well) to promote it. Hunter wrote:

In theory, Trump is running for president. You'd be hard-pressed to find him on the campaign trail, mind you, and on days when he doesn't have to be in a courtroom, he appears to be devoting himself to golf championships and picking the pettiest possible fights. His aides can't rouse him into leaving his home to campaign on more than a sporadic basis, but for an unknown licensing fee, he'll dust himself off, set up a couple of American flags behind him and hold up whatever book you want. I don't know what kind of person thinks to themselves, “You know, I really need a Bible, but I don't like how focused most of them are on Jesus. Is there a version that waters that down a bit with random, unrelated patriotic schlock?”

Underprivileged is not unqualified

My Sunday movie was Young Royals, season 3, episodes 3 & 4. And, yes, here be spoilers. The school is a month or so from graduation. Simon is seeing a lot more clearly what dating a royal means (though I think the palace should still give him a class). Simon attends, as he has before, the May 1st demonstrations for worker rights and that doesn’t sit well with the palace. Someone threw a rock through a window of Simon’s home, so palace security has to get involved. Wilhelm and Simon are seeing how different they and their backgrounds are. Wilhelm’s mother the queen is having a nervous breakdown and he’s afraid he’ll have to start fulfilling her duties. And August is still playing his mind games. Late in episode 4 some dialogue implied that August was at the school much longer than Wilhelm was, yet they’re graduating in the same year. That dialogue was another of August’s mind games. This week is Holy Week, the time between Palm Sunday and Easter, with a few extra worship services, if that’s your thing. My performance group won’t rehearse this week because so many members are church musicians. My own church bell group isn’t rehearsing tonight because half the group had other commitments. So I don’t have any evening rehearsals this week. Which gives me time to blog – or finish off Young Royals. Or both. So, episode 5. Some of the timeline issues were cleared up. Simon brought Wilhelm a birthday cupcake and it had a 17 on it. I had expected 18. There was also a graduating class dinner and many of the girls who I thought were graduating were servers at the meal. I realized it is August’s graduation, but not Wilhelm’s or Simon’s or the girls who were serving. A big part of this episode is a birthday party for Wilhelm at the palace. Simon was invited, partly to support Wilhelm and partly to meet the parents – the queen and duke. Simon got a suit for the occasion and I could tell it was too big for him. Was the a way for the costumers to say Wilhelm as a royal gets well fitting suits and Simon as a commoner gets badly fitting suits? That birthday party did not go well. Thankfully, it wasn’t because the parents were upset that their son’s lover was another boy. But there were a lot of unresolved issues around Wilhelm not liking being a royal and his parents seemed to be handling it in a passive-aggressive manner. I plan on watching episode 6, the finale of the whole series, tomorrow. Last Friday I wrote about the nasty guy’s options on meeting the $454 million judgment against him in the civil fraud case. At the top of the list I wrote:

An appeals court could step in because in the current American legal system “courts generally despise the thought of handing out big penalties to wealthy financial crooks.”

I mention it because, as reported by Hunter of Daily Kos, (of course) the Appellate Division of the Manhattan Supreme Court said the nasty guy has to pay (or have bonds for) $175 million instead of the full amount before he can appeal the case. He now has ten days to cover the smaller amount. The nasty guy had claimed he can’t pay the $454 million. The $175 million is an amount he has been saying he can come up with. How convenient. And yes, the court gave him a big favor. What’s next is the nasty guy pays (or has bonds for) $175 million. He can then file an appeal. So far the nasty guy’s lawyers can’t explain what parts of the ruling they plan to appeal. If he doesn’t have an appealable case, then he’s back to owing $454 million, plus interest. More likely is the process drags out beyond the election, as appears to be happening with many of his trials. His hope is to get back to the Oval Office and use his authoritarian power to make even this state case go away. In an Earth Matters column for Kos Meteor Blades included a couple interesting topics. First, Republicans are, as they have always been, saying they don’t believe the climate scientists and they are trying to limit the Inflation Reduction Act, with all its goodies to protect the climate (though not nearly enough for what’s needed). As examples, Blades listed several bills taken up by the House that undo IRA provisions. Some have passed the House (alas, some with a few to several Democratic votes), others are still in committee. Getting past the Senate is doubtful. They won’t get past Biden. Even so, this shows what Republicans intend. The other interesting story starts off this way:

The Environmental Integrity Project published its “Feeding the Plastics Industrial Complex” in mid-March. The key findings: 64% of plastics manufacturing plants built or expanded since 2012 received tax subsidies totaling $9 billion, and 84% violated federal air pollution limits. These subsidies cost nearly twice as much as the combined budgets of the state agencies in Texas and Louisiana tasked with regulating most plastics plants in their jurisdictions.

In a thread on Threadreader, Michael Harriot discusses diversity, equity, and inclusion policies at Duke Medical School. Some say DEI initiatives lower standards, others say that’s false. Who is right? First, DEI policies aren’t about lowering standards, they’re about inviting more diverse students to apply and then helping them stay in the program. Under the program the applicants’ GPA increased and the total number of white students also increased (so who is taking spots away from white students?). Duke also found the admission process favored the privileged (children of doctors who know how to navigate the system) and the rich. So they changed it. The “underprivileged” students may not do as well in the first year – but they did better than the privileged students starting in the second year. One more thing. If Duke lowered it standards its graduates – including the white ones – would have a harder time finding jobs. Also, the rich and privileged would stop sending their kids to an inferior school. Underprivileged is not unqualified. In a pundit roundup for Kos Chitown Kev had a couple interesting quotes. George Makari and Richard Friedman of The Atlantic wrote that we as a nation (perhaps the whole world?) have not dealt with the effects of COVID that is still killing hundreds a week.

Almost overnight, most of the country was thrown into a state of high anxiety—then, soon enough, grief and mourning. But the country has not come together to sufficiently acknowledge the tragedy it endured. As clinical psychiatrists, we see the effects of such emotional turmoil every day, and we know that when it’s not properly processed, it can result in a general sense of unhappiness and anger—exactly the negative emotional state that might lead a nation to misperceive its fortunes.

Perhaps that is why so many people believe the economy isn’t doing well in spite of the data saying it is doing great? Makari and Friedman added:

We are not suggesting that the entire country has PTSD from COVID. In fact, the majority of people who are exposed to trauma do not go on to exhibit the symptoms of PTSD. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t deeply affected. In our lifetime, COVID posed an unprecedented threat in both its overwhelming scope and severity; it left most Americans unable to protect themselves and, at times, at a loss to comprehend what was happening. That meets the clinical definition of trauma: an overwhelming experience in which you are threatened with serious physical or psychological harm.

Kev also quoted Nick Paton Walsh of CNN discussing Russia and the terrorist attack at the concert hall.

It exposes how far adrift and overstretched Putin now is. The safety of his muted, urban electorate in the capital has been entirely sacrificed to his war of choice in Ukraine. Special forces did not race in; they are dead, or busy elsewhere. Even some police have been deployed to the frontlines. ... There is so much the Russian system of authoritarianism cannot quash. It relies on patriarchy, fealty, corruption and a curious sense that the tsar, in this case Putin, will intervene to right palpable wrongs. But he does not. He does not always know how badly his state is functioning. And so, four young men can just roll up with automatic weapons to a vast Moscow mall and set fire to it, after shooting dozens dead.

A cartoon posted by Marian Kamensky shows Putin chasing Zelenskyy while a mob chases Putin. Biden says, “Be careful, Vladimir, ISIS-Terrorists!” And Putin responds, “Oh Joe, is that your cheap distraction?”

We suffered first so we're justified in making others suffer

I finished reading All Boys Aren’t Blue by George Matthew Johnson. Yes, it is one of the frequently banned books. Johnson tells the story of growing up both black and queer. Along the way he explains things because he wants young black and queer kids to know things he learned the hard way. His ability to explain (well, that and a couple sex scenes) is why the book is so frequently targeted for banning. He talks about trauma and how we don’t help kids to recover from trauma. He talks about being effeminate and more comfortable playing with girls than boys and the girls more accepting of him than the boys are, though when challenged to play football he’s pretty good. He talks about microaggressions and explains what they are and how the target can respond. He also talks about his family. As he grows he discovers his extended family’s LGBTQ members – a cousin who is trans, a much older half brother and a cousin who are gay. So his family is an oasis and the families of other black queer kids are not. He is especially thankful for his grandmother, called Nanny, who is a major caregiver because his parents work long hours. She also recognizes why he doesn’t have a circle of friends and provides that friendship. He talks about names. He is called by his middle name and doesn’t learn of his first name until well into his school years. He goes into a Catholic high school and they insist on using his first name. So he’s Matthew to some and George to others. He says we have a right to name ourselves. He thinks college in another state will allow him to be fully out, but his hesitancy follows him. He understands that now – even if a child knows they will be accepted they still may not be ready to tell others. And a person should take the time they need. I highly recommend this one. Johnson writes at a level a teenager can understand and explains things well. It’s also a pretty good story. Charles Jay of the Daily Kos community wrote about the similarities between the nasty guy and Hitler. This was prompted by the nasty guy referring to the January 6 insurrectionists as martyrs. After showing where and when the nasty guy called them martyrs Jay quoted one of Yale history professor Timothy Snyder’s Substack articles.

The cult of criminals as martyrs also suggests a historical context: the fascist politics of violence. Before Hitler came to power, Goebbels worked hard to find a violent Nazi who could be portrayed as a victim of the far left. He eventually found a dubious character called Horst Wessel, who became the subject of the Nazis' main song. Trump has made an eerily similar move, turning his coup criminals into musicians of martyrdom. The fascist-style martyrdom cult justifies violence, in two ways. It makes a hero of criminals, thereby making criminality exemplary. And it establishes prior innocence – we suffered first, and therefore anything we do to make others suffer will always be justified. The Nazis sang their Horst Wessel Song as they conquered countries and killed millions.

Jay also quoted New York University historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat, an expert on authoritarian leaders.

Fascism evolved out of paramilitary environments, with a cult leader who orchestrated violence. Once in power, Fascists used propaganda to change the public's perception of violence, associating it with patriotism and national defense against internal and external enemies. Rallies were crucial to that end.

We’re not immune from fascism. An Associated Press article posted on Kos begins:

Donald Trump's new joint fundraising agreement with the Republican National Committee directs donations to his campaign and a political action committee that pays the former president's legal bills before the RNC gets a cut, according to a fundraising invitation obtained by The Associated Press.

Give to the RNC and a big chunk goes to the nasty guy’s campaign (and a chunk of that goes to his legal bills). Another big chunk goes to this Save America PAC and most of that goes to pay the nasty guy’s legal bills. Whatever is left over goes to the RNC where they might have a few coins to help other Republicans get elected. In a pundit roundup for Kos Greg Dworkin had a couple interesting quotes. First, from Bill Scher of Washington Monthly. Scher talks about the ominous things the nasty guy says, like he recently said, “bloodbath.” Democrats should not get caught in trying to parse what he was referring to and what it means. That debate obscures the problem. Instead, the Biden team and other Democrats can simply say:

There he goes again, turning Americans against each other with irresponsible rhetoric. We know how this ends.

Dworkin quoted David Rothkopf, writing in Haaretz, which is pretty much summarized in the title.

If Gaza's Children Starve, Israel Will Lose Its Moral Legitimacy Forever

Down in the comments is a cartoon posted by Joe Heller. A man going through airport security asks, “Why am I scrutinized more than the aircraft?” David Nir of Kos Elections reported that Rep. Ken Buck, who had announced his resignation from the House previously had his last day Friday, leaving as the Passover/Easter break began. Also on Friday Rep. Mike Gallagher announced his resignation, effective April 19. While Buck will be replace by June, Gallagher resigned after certain deadlines so his seat won’t be filled until November. Add to that a special election for a safely blue seat to be filled on April 30 and the Republican majority will be down to one vote. That might be why many Republicans aren’t willing to oust Johnson. They’re afraid he’ll be replaced with a Democrat. In another pundit roundup Dworkin quoted Thomas Zimmer writing for his Democracy Americana on Substack and about Project 2025. That’s the effort to have authoritarian plans in place for any future Republican president who may want to use them. Zimmer notes that many people believe a second nasty guy presidency would feature the bumbling oaf of the first, and that Republican are too fractured to have the necessary discipline for an ambitious agenda. Then Zimmer wrote:

But too strong a focus on Trump’s erratic nature and the many rivalries on the Right obscures the fact that reactionaries are actually united by the desire to punish their enemies, “take back” the country, and restore the “natural order” of unquestioned white Christian patriarchal rule – a unity that is indicative of a broader realignment on the Right towards an aggressive embrace of state authoritarianism.

A meme and a cartoon from the comments in a third pundit roundup. The meme was posted by Kos member exlrrp.

Best meme of the day, bar none [Photo of Biden] Raised the bar [Photo of Rep. Jim Jordan] Failed the bar [Rep. Lauren Boebert] Worked at a bar [Rudy Giuliani] Lives at the bar [Eric Trump] Can’t spell “The Bar” [nasty guy] Should be behind bars

A cartoon by M. Wuerker shows a huge crowd with signs and banners that say: Love, Say No to Hate, United We Stand, Hate Has No Home Here, Hope. In front of them are four people, one in a Klan robe, holding up: Hate. The many people of the media are focused on the four people and not the huge crowd. The news has been full of reports from Moscow about a concert hall that had been attacked. There are 133 reported dead, many more injured. The attackers used explosives to burn the hall, leaving it a ruin. ISIS extremists claimed credit for the attack. The US says they had warned Putin. Thom Hartmann of the Kos community discussed what came next. When Putin finally gave an address he didn’t mention ISIS. He did try to link the attack to Ukraine. And the “special operation” has officially become a war. Hartmann then discussed when other such attacks gave a despot an opportunity to attack his perceived enemies. Back in 2002 another attack on a Moscow theater gave Putin the chance to massively attack Chechnya. The Reichstag fire in Berlin in 1933 prompted Hitler (who had been warned) to implement his harsh takeover of Germany. In 2001 Bush II (who had been warned) used the 9/11 attack to launch a war in Afghanistan and Iraq (yeah, 9/11 had nothing to do with Iraq, which is the point). Last year Netanyahu of Israel ignored the warnings of an attack by Hamas and when it happened he used it as a reason to commence what now looks like an attempt at genocide of Palestinians. And in 1914 the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand in Sarajevo triggered WWI. So will Putin use a ruined theater and 133 dead and many more injured as a reason to massively bomb Kyiv? That would provoke a stronger response from NATO which has several countries considered Putin’s likely next targets. Now combine that with the Republicans in Congress holding up military aid to Ukraine. Will this attack be what triggers WWIII?

Would love to convince us that our democracy doesn’t work

Walter Einenkel of Daily Kos reported that the latest stunts in the House Oversight Committee to slander and attempt to impeach Biden went so poorly that many people are declaring the impeachment effort to be dead. Though reading through this post I should clarify that Democrats on the committee declared it dead. I suppose their cause is helped by Sean Hannity on Fox News not bothering to report on the latest effort.

Rep. Eric Swalwell used his time to pronounce the sham inquiry “Dunzo. Bye bye. Rigor mortis. Lights out. Curtain drop. Mic drop. Peace. Adios. Sayonara. Au revoir. Or a language that you all understand, ‘Do svidaniya.’”

Will Republicans continue to flog the corpse? The nasty guy has until Monday to post bond for the nearly half billion judgment against him and I wrote he appears to not have the money. Hunter of Kos listed the ways that deadline might be met. An appeals court could step in because in the current American legal system “courts generally despise the thought of handing out big penalties to wealthy financial crooks.” Instead of one $464 million bond he could try for several $100 million bonds. But with the nasty guy’s reputation for inflating the value of his assets who will accept his real estate as collateral? He could sell property, but buyers don’t have time to verify the quality of the goods. A foreign power might offer a “loan” – in the manner of the Saudis giving the Pandemic Prince and Princess $2 billion. (Hmm. This fine is only a quarter of what was given them. Maybe daughter would bail him out?) Such a “loan” would be called if the nasty guy returned to the Oval Office, though payment probably won’t be in cash. He could declare bankruptcy, but that would severely tarnish his image as candidate for president and that is much more valuable to him. Or he could do nothing now. Then when assets are seized he campaigns on how unfairly he’s been treated. He might be surprised, if he wins, how hard it will be to get some of those assets back. Bob in Portland, Maine, in his Cheers and Jeers column for Kos quoted late night commentary:

“Donald Trump is having some money problems. He’s having trouble coming up with a $464 million bond to cover the judgment against him in New York. Trump has until Monday to get the bond, and if he doesn’t, the attorney general may start seizing his assets. They could even seize his plane. I vote for that. I can think of nothing more delightful. Can you imagine the sight of Donald Trump standing in line for a Southwest flight in boarding group C? … But of course the real loser here is Melania. She may end up with half of the nothing he owns now. I hope she got an advance on that prenup, because if you think she hates him now, wait until he’s poor." —Jimmy Kimmel "[My student debt relief program] doesn’t apply to everyone. Just yesterday, a defeated-looking man came up and said, 'I’m being crushed by debt. I’m completely wiped out.' I said, ‘Sorry, Donald, I can’t help out.' ” —President Biden, at the Gridiron Dinner

Remember the 2016 campaign when the nasty guy seemed to surround himself with people who turned out to be criminals? At the top of the list were Paul Manafort, Corey Lewandowski, and Roger Stone. Hunter reports they’re back.

It's going to be a clown show, yes, but it's also going to be incredibly dangerous for the country. Trump has thrown his lot in with theocratic fascists, with seditionists, and most of all with those willing to bend laws as much as is necessary to cement far-right rule.

Aldous Pennyfarthing of the Kos community reported a case of another Republican who switched a very principled position to bend a knee to the nasty guy. Then Pennyfarthing contrasted that with a few Republicans who haven’t bent their knee and ends with Liz Cheney talking to Stephen Colbert. Here’s a bit of that.

The way to think about it is, America’s adversaries would love nothing more than to convince us that our democracy doesn’t work, and right now you have Donald Trump and the Republicans who support him doing the work of our adversaries. And it is a really dangerous thing we’re seeing, and it’s especially dangerous because the president of the United States is responsible for enforcing the laws. He’s responsible for ensuring the laws are faithfully executed.

Kaili Joy Gray of Kos reported the nasty guy asked the quadrennial campaign question, “Are you better off than four years ago?” Biden tweeted a response: “Donald, I’m glad you asked.” He included a video of how bad and deadly the pandemic was in March of 2020. Joan McCarter of Kos reported that Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has filed a “motion to vacate the chair.” Yeah, that was the same motion that led to the ouster of Kevin McCarthy only six months ago. Greene filed it because she and the Freedom Caucus were upset with the budget bills the House approved with a lot of Democrat support to prevent a government shutdown this weekend (if the Senate can act in time). Though Greene filed it, she didn’t activate it. That means the House didn’t have to vote on it immediately (which is good because after the budget vote they started a two week break for Passover and Easter). This time the gang that ousted McCarthy don’t seem to be so interested in ousting Johnson. Democrats may even consider protecting Johnson – for a price, like moving the aid to Ukraine bill. Though that might convince more Republicans that an ouster is needed. Charles Jay of the Kos community reported Sen. Elizabeth Warren reintroduced the Ultra-Millionaire Tax Act, which would be a 2 cent tax on every dollar of net worth over $50 million and a 3 cent tax on every dollar of net worth over $1 billion. And if one tries to flee to a tax haven there is a 40% exit tax. Yeah, Senate Republicans will filibuster it. And the House would kill it. But introducing it now isn’t just for this year. It is now a campaign issue. Jay adds a few statistics to back up why voters would see it as important.

According to University of California-Berkeley economists Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman, the richest top 0.1% have seen their share of American wealth triple from 7% to 20% between the late 1970s and 2019, while the bottom 90% have seen their share drop from about 35% to 25%. ... ProPublica found that the 25 richest Americans paid a true federal tax rate of only 3.4%, while the median American household earned about $70,000 annually and paid 14% in federal taxes. And Amazon’s Bezos? He had a true tax rate of only 1%.

Last week United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain testified before the Senate and Einenkel posted a bit of video and transcript. Fain noted people in the Senate will say working class people are lazy. He said there is an epidemic of lazy people, who freeload off the labor of others, but they’re not the working class.

It's a group of people who are never talked about for how little they actually work and produce, and how little they contribute to humanity. The people I'm talking about are the Wall Street freeloaders, the masters of passive income. Those who profit off the labor of others have all the time in the world, while those who make this country run, the people who build the products and contribute to labor have less and less time for themselves, for their families, and for their lives.

Raking in huge profits and pretending needing to be rescued

Mark Sumner of Daily Kos, in this week’s edition of stories to know series included:

On March 8, the NOAA announced that this has been the warmest winter in U.S. history, with overall temperatures 5.4 degrees above average. The winter was also wetter than usual. That may generate temporary relief in some drought areas, but it's unclear if this will continue into summer, when more record heat is expected.

Sumner also included a video created by Steve Shives who discusses how comics are important to life. In this 23 minute video Shives talks about an edition of DC Comics Superman from 20 years ago and why this particular story is relevant to today. I’ve watched an occasional movie based on DC and Marvel comics. It’s been many years since I have, mostly because there is too much violence. In this story Superman faces some bad guys that act like good guys in that they get rid of other bad guys. The reason why Superman considers them bad is they are unconcerned with collateral damage and they think killing the actual bad guys is a good thing. Superman responds with why disabling the bad guys, yet keeping them alive, is better. The story also include Superman listening to why people are drawn to his new enemies (as people are always drawn to strongmen). Yes, there are a lot of intentional parallels to authoritarians, even though this was published before the current batch. Superman’s way allows the author to explain to the characters and to us why Superman’s way is preferable. Back to the climate. In an Earth Matters column for Kos, Meteor Blades, had a few interesting stories. Rebecca Burns of Sierra magazine wrote about the latest tricks the climate deniers are using. Blades wrote about a couple of them. One is going into rural communities and get the residents riled up against wind turbines. Of course, the reasoning they use is mostly lies (I’m not familiar with how loud a wind turbine actually is and whether the claimed noise is a lie). They also go to state legislatures to restrict spending on climate action. When visiting my aunt and uncle in Ohio several months (or maybe a couple years) ago I saw small signs by the road at some farms saying the owner was against a wind project. My aunt lamented the appearance of these signs and said they were because of what the Sierra magazine discussed. Blades also wrote about a study from the Environmental Protection Agency about the life cycle emissions of electric vehicles. There are claims that EVs are as bad or are worse that ICE (internal combustion engine) cars. The claim says one must add in the emissions during manufacturing, especially of batteries, and the emissions of generating the electricity. The EPA looked at EVs in five countries. In France EVs are cleaner (even considering all sources of emissions) after 25K kilometers (15K miles), while in China the breakeven point is 153K km (92K miles). But as manufacturing of batteries becomes more efficient and power plants switch to cleaner sources the breakeven point will drop. FishOutofWater of the Kos community posted the Atlantic heat anomaly map for March 12. Yeah, the water is warm and has set a new record. Last year the sea surface temperature started heading higher than previous readings at the end of April. It set a record in mid August. This year the readings are way above previous readings for this time of year and earlier this month topped August’s reading. The rest of the post gets rather technical, but it leaves with this thought: The 2024 hurricane season could be nasty. Sumner looked at the nasty guy’s claim (threat?) to “Drill, baby, drill” if he gets back to the Oval Office. But...

The idea that President Joe Biden is holding back American energy production and has “destroyed U.S. energy independence” is being spread not just by Trump but also by Republicans in the House and Senate. Claims of a Biden “war on energy” are front and center in Republican campaigns, in claims by the conservative Heritage Foundation, and in Trump’s dictatorial ambitions. But all of this is just lies, baby, lies.

The US is in the middle of a record oil boom. It hasn’t needed to import oil since about 2020 and now produces enough to export. That’s while the US had a record year for renewable energy and installing renewable capacity. While the nasty guy’s – and Republican’s – claims are easily disproved, energy is supposed to be one of the issues Republicans are good at. That “drill, baby, drill” line has been used by Republicans since at least 2008. Republicans are making energy an issue because the oil and gas industry is a significant donor – and because Biden keeps calling for immensely profitable companies, like oil and gas companies, pay their fair share in taxes.

It also helps that Republicans are still calling both renewable energy and the climate crisis is a hoax. Fossil fuel companies really like that. Give them lower taxes, lower regulations, cheap public land, and cripple their competition? They’ll take that any day. So they’re both raking in huge amounts of money and pretending that they need to be rescued from mean old Biden.

A week ago I thought I’d soon be writing about my forsythia blooming. A few years ago I posted that it bloomed at the end of March, which was rare. And now I’m looking at it blooming in mid March. Except we are having a cold snap and maybe snow tomorrow. So instead of blooming it looks like most of the buds on a few of the shrubs were killed by the cold. This is the second time my forsythia didn’t bloom because early warm days were followed by cold ones. Dartagnan of the Kos community wrote about the practice of judge shopping. Conservative ideologues would file their case in the court of a judge they knew would be friendly to whatever cause they wanted to enforce across the country that they knew would never be approved through the ballot box. Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of Amarillo has gained fame for being the judge of choice for the forced-birth movement. He’ll give them what they want, no matter hour convoluted his ruling. Since Kacsmaryk is the only federal judge in Amarillo he handles all cases. If they’re appealed (and they are) they go to the conservative 5th Circuit Court. So last week the Judicial Conference of the United States, which creates policy for the federal courts, unveiled a plan to end judge shopping. The plan was that cases would be randomly assigned to one of the federal courts in a state (or region) so plaintiffs couldn’t pick their judge. There was joy that such anti-democracy practices would be ended. That joy lasted about three days. Then far right judges, as well as members of Congress who installed them (like Moscow Mitch), started complaining. And quite quickly the Judicial Conference said the plan is only “guidance” (which can and will be ignored).

It’s telling that nearly all of the objections cited by The Washington Post come from Republican-appointed judges and their backers. But as corrosive to the legal system as the practice of judge shopping is, thanks to the seeding of the federal judiciary with these transparent ideologues, the entire institution is now appearing more and more tainted. ... Due to this rampant ideological corruption—from the top on down—conservatives are gradually transforming the federal judiciary into an institution that many Americans sensibly fear, especially since it can take away established rights without being held accountable. It is a judiciary that does not foster the notions of fairness that Americans have every right to expect from it. It is a judiciary that is becoming increasingly illegitimate in the eyes of the public, because its application of the law is increasingly seen as selective, arbitrary, and politically infused. No ham-handed public relations campaign from the Supreme Court is going to change that, particularly in a system where constitutional law professors can no longer even look their students in the eye and assure them that the nation’s founding principles are being fairly interpreted and applied. Americans should not have to live in dread of how some unelected judge in Amarillo or Fort Worth may decide to rule on an issue that could seriously alter their lives. They shouldn’t have to put up with the arrogance of an unaccountable judiciary that has been deliberately manipulated to fast-track the rabid dreams of domination by a tiny minority.

Mark Ira Kaufman of the Kos community looked at the Jewish Bible (the Christian Old Testament) and showed – contrary to the strong emphasis of Christian evangelicals – the Bible does not command belief in God. Instead, what is commanded is to do what God wants us to do. And what he wants is for us to help and love each other.

The flawed human heart is especially problematic for those whose reliance is on faith to be right by God. Why? Faith, unfettered by reason, is a product of that messed up heart. But if faith doesn't impress God, what is there that can? The answer is offered in the very next verse, calling for righteous conduct. So for those of you pious reprobates who think you're hot stuff in God's eye because of your faith, think again. And don't blame me that your faith might not mean anything to God. I didn't write the Bible.

That “very next verse” is at the top of the Ten Commandments (which Jews call the Ten Utterances), in which God says don’t worship anything else. But why do we need to “impress” God? Doesn’t He love us anyway?

He catastrophizes everything

My Sunday viewing was the first two episodes of season three of Young Royals. I watched season 1 almost two years ago and season 2 sixteen months ago. But season three just dropped – yeah, I’ve been watching for it and saw the release date announced a few weeks ago. When I wrote about the first two seasons I didn’t say much to avoid spoilers. Enough of that. So if you haven’t seen the earlier seasons (and I recommend you do) you might want to skip to the next topic and come back after 9 hours of viewing. As for these summaries of the earlier seasons, it’s been a while since I watched them. Hours of viewing will be compressed to a few paragraphs. Young Royals is the story of Prince Wilhelm of Sweden. In the first series he was sent off to boarding school at Hillerska. There he would have cousin August to watch over him. I see now when the series started that I though August was in his third (and last) year, but he’s still there in season 3, so they must be the same age. Which implies August was an excellent leader to get to be the rowing captain in his first year – or August was too useful an antagonist to be left out of the third season. In that first season Wilhelm falls in love with Simon, a commoner also attending the school. Wilhelm and Simon are making out as August records them through the window. August releases the video and Wilhelm has to deny his love. In season two Wilhelm is feeling a bit rebellious and gets into trouble. He and August play mind games with each other. August’s girlfriend figures out he made the video. August convinces a classmate to take the fall. But there is a showdown. At the end of the school year Wilhelm is to give a speech and he scraps the text supplied by the palace and admits that he was in the video with Simon. On to season three, episodes 1 and 2. It is now a couple months before graduation. Wilhelm and Simon can be open about their relationship, but there is now a great deal of scrutiny and paparazzi. Other students, ones who aren’t friends with Wilhelm, start spreading stories about some of the salacious parties and rituals at the school, which the paparazzi lap up. Most aren’t true. The students are given a curfew, including no cell phone use except an hour after dinner. Since Wilhelm lives at the school and Simon doesn’t they chafe at so little time together. At a social gathering towards the end of episode 2 one of Simon’s friends talks about his summer job. Wilhelm makes a social blunder by saying he will also have a summer job. Simon is annoyed because Wilhelm will be an adult and that job is a course in how to be a prince and assume royal duties. Simon accuses Wilhelm of being clueless about the privilege he has. That got me wondering whether the palace will require Simon to take lessons on how to be a proper prince consort. It would lessen the chance of Simon making inappropriate social media posts. In England did Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle take lessons on how to be wives of princes? Many times when Simon talks to his mother the show doesn’t dub their words into English, instead switches to subtitles. This has happened through the series. I realized why: They’re not speaking Swedish, they’re speaking his mother’s native language (which I don’t recognize). I’m pretty sure Simon’s dad is Swedish and it looks like his mother is an immigrant. The prince falling in love with an immigrant’s son is another dimension to the story. I reread what I wrote about seasons 1 and 2. At the end of season 1 I said I’d watch season 2, but probably not season 3. And here I am watching season 3 and will finish it. I downloaded Michigan’s COVID data today. The website says March 12 was the last day the website would be updated with COVID cases and deaths, though the data would stay around. So the graph my program drew is based on data a week old. I’m disappointed the data won’t be updated because the graph shows COVID isn’t gone. Just three weeks ago the number of new cases per day almost hit one thousand. That number has dropped since then but just a few days before the data ended it was at 325 cases per day. That’s much better than the 1845 cases per day hit at the end of December, but about twice the rate of early last July. The number of deaths per day has been under ten since late January. Hunter of Daily Kos reported the nasty guy doesn’t have and can’t get the money to pay the $454 million fine in his civil fraud judgment. He wants to appeal the ruling but he must post a bond for the full amount before he can file the appeal. And he can’t find any company willing to issue that bond. Many legally can’t issue a bond that big. Others won’t accept real estate as collateral. By telling the court that getting such a bond is “not possible” is humiliating for a supposed billionaire.

What's clear, though, is that no one appears willing to risk losing a half billion dollars for the sake of propping up Donald Trump. It's not just that Trump's countless lies about his supposed assets make it risky to do business with him; Trump's currently running for president again, and this time around he and his subordinates are making it clear that they intend a far more radical, fascist, and authoritarian-minded Trump administration this time around. If Trump does retake the presidency, what are the odds that both his administration and a compliant Republican Congress will simply void all his debts and tell his creditors to pound sand? Not small. And certainly not small enough that anyone is willing to take the risk.

Kerry Eleveld of Kos added:

As The New Republic's Timothy Noah told Greg Sargent on his new Daily Blast podcast, "Trump is broke, on the verge of bankruptcy, and he's running for president. It's a situation just ripe for corruption." The presidency, should Trump win it, is effectively up for sale to the highest bidder. But Trump's personal financial issues are just the tip of the iceberg for the man who just last week secured enough delegates to be the 2024 Republican nominee for president.

Eleveld explained the financial issues: Small donors to his campaign are donating much less. The big Republican donors switched from supporting Haley to supporting Republican candidates for Congress. Though the nasty guy has taken over the Republican National Committee, it is also essentially broke (that takeover is why big donors are supporting candidates directly). And Liz Cheney tweeted “Donors better beware.” Topping it off is the Republican party feud between the establishment members and the Freedom Caucus. Eleveld reported on the news that’s getting a lot of airtime. In a rally the nasty guy said, “Now if I don’t get elected, ... it's going to be a bloodbath for the country.” The rest of Eleveld’s post is a variety of ways, most of them good, various media are reporting on those words. There is some room for interpretation because the nasty guy said them as he was discussing the auto industry. In a pundit roundup for Kos Greg Dworkin included a couple good quotes on that statement. First, a tweet from Brian Schatz:

Headline writers: Don’t outsmart yourself. Just do “Trump Promises Bloodbath if he Doesn’t Win Election.”

And from a thread by George Conway:

I’m willing to assume for the sake of argument that he was referring to cars. And it makes no difference to his malicious intent or to the danger he and his rhetoric poses. What matters is that he consistently uses apocalyptic and violent language in an indiscriminate fashion as a result of his psychopathy and correlative authoritarian tendencies, and because he’s just plain evil. It’s a classic trait and technique of authoritarian demagogues. He catastrophizes *everything* to rile up his cultish supporters, and to bind them to him, and to make them willing to do his bidding

In another pundit roundup Chitown Kev quoted Renée Graham of the Boston Globe:

There are few among us who don’t know how it feels to be the butt of a joke. At some point in our lives, we’ve probably been the person being laughed at instead of being someone in on the joke and chuckling with the crowd. That includes Trump’s supporters. But with their always aggrieved state of mind, they have anointed Trump as a strongman who allows them to belittle those they see as their lessers. To paraphrase the great Toni Morrison, they can only feel tall when someone else has been knocked to their knees. For them, Trump’s enemies are their enemies and those people deserve nothing but public derision. Of course like all bullies who are, in fact, weak and insecure, Trump can’t take what he so readily dishes out.

Dartagnan of the Kos community discussed the nasty guy’s vow to release the Jan. 6 insurrectionists and why that is bad.

Dictatorships tend to consolidate their power very quickly. So quickly, in fact, that a population may not fully comprehend the magnitude of what has happened to their society. This “shock and awe” is employed to underscore—as immediately as possible—the dictator’s power and to intimidate opposition by convincing people to believe that opposition is futile. In the United States, Donald Trump has freely acknowledged his intent to become a dictator on “Day One” if he is reelected.

Unlike the nasty guy’s other indictments, the on on inciting the Capitol attack is a “shocking, visual, public record of the actual, real-world consequences of his behavior.” That’s why Republicans are trying to recharacterize the attack. And a pardon would demonstrate the nasty guy’s power and rebuke the justice system that has indicted him. But the abuse of that pardon has big implications. A pardon would repudiate the prosecutors, judges, and juries that convicted the attackers and that said what they did deserved punishment. That’s a massive slap in the face of the American criminal justice system. The nasty guy would appoint himself judge and jury. It would legitimize political violence because attackers know those in power will protect them, leading to increased domestic terrorism. It would also be a slap in the face of the police who were protecting the Capitol that day. A third slap is directed at citizens who expect the law to be carried out fairly. Finally, the insurrection leadership, the guys that got the longest sentences, would be eager to resume their roles, now emboldened by the nasty guy.

To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies

I saw the play Beautiful Thing at the Ringwald last evening. It was, alas, not the great production like I had experienced at the Ringwald before. Part of it is the Ringwald’s new location. They gave up a space with perhaps a hundred seats and moved into a community room with 40 seats at Affirmations, the LGBTQ community center in Ferndale. I’m sure this is a big win for Affirmations. The directors of the Ringwald are a gay couple, so their types of plays fit well with Affirmations. Part of it is the Ringwald box office (a woman standing at a desk) didn’t know what to do with the cash I handed her and one saw the program by scanning a QR code with their phone (I rarely take my phone with me). And part of it is the play. The story takes place mostly in the common yard of three adjacent row houses in London. Jamie is 15 and lives in the right house with his mother Sondra and her boyfriend Tony, only a dozen years older than Jamie. In the middle house lives Leah (I think that’s her name, I don’t have a program to check) who lives with her mother, whom we never see. Leah is about the same age as Jamie and has some sort of medical condition (the show opens with Leah filling a pill reminder) that keeps her out of school. In the left house is Ste (short for Steven), also 15, who lives with his father and brother (occasionally heard, but not seen). Dysfunctional families all around. Ste’s dad is violent, so Ste frequently sleeps in Jamie’s bed. At first, sleep is the operative word. But soon they realize they’re attracted to each other. Then they, especially Ste, are terrified of their parents finding out. I think the acting was decent. But the production had me thinking it was the quality of a college production, not a professional theater. I wonder if my displeasure was because there was too much focus on Leah and her issues and that prevented a fuller exploration and resolution of the relationship between Jamie and Ste. The show plays weekends through the end of the month. I finished the book Parable of the Talents by Octavia Butler. This is the sequel to her book Parable of the Sower, which I wrote about back in November. In the first book Lauren, a black girl, grew up in a walled community, not because she was rich, but because the surrounding Los Angeles area was quite dangerous. While there she started developing the philosophy of Earthseed. Then disaster struck. She fled with a few survivors and walked north, gathering a community around her for protection as she went. The first book ended as they reached land in northern California owned by the man who became her husband. At the start of the second book, five years later in the year 2032, her community has established Acorn, where they live according to the ways of Earthseed. Running for president that year is Andrew Steele Jarrett, a pastor who is preaching (all his campaign speeches are really sermons) that America is in such a bad position because the country has turned its back on God. We’ve met this type in real life. In describing his campaign Lauren actually uses the phrase “Make America Great Again.” That’s a lot of foresight for a book published in 1998. Jarrett becomes president because so many people think the country needs a strongman to put things rights. Voters don’t realize he has his own view of what putting right means. Shortly after taking office Jarrett establishes the Christian American Church. A few months after that some of Jarrett’s goons invade Acorn because Earthseed is definitely not Christian, so must be heathen and residents need to be educated in proper Christian theology. That’s another way of saying the invaders are using God as a cover for inflicting their cruelty. What they do is illegal, but there is no one to stop them. Jarrett disavows connection to the goons, but doesn’t condemn them. Those that survive the invasion are enslaved and their children taken to be raised by proper Christian families. That includes Lauren’s two month old daughter. The rest of the book is about Lauren surviving slavery, trying to find her daughter, and trying to come up with a way of spreading her Earthseed philosophy. The title comes from the book of Matthew in the Bible. I’ll summarize: Just before a business man leaves on a trip he gives one servant five talents, another two, and another one. The servant given five earns five more. The one given two earns two more. The one given a single talent hides it so it isn’t stolen yet doesn’t earn even interest. When the business man returns he praises the efforts of those who now have ten and four talents. But he is quite angry with the servant who does nothing with the one talent. Scholars say the story works well both with talent referring to a unit of money and with our modern definition of a skill which a person does well. In that second meaning we each have things we are good at. We must develop them and use them for the community. In the context of the book Lauren’s talent is this philosophy she assembled and feels she must spread to the wider world. I like the Earthseed philosophy, at least the verses that are in the book. The basic idea is that change happens and one must figure out how to manage the change and perhaps direct it. At the top of her verses are: God is Change. One is changed by God and one can change God. There is also a Destiny that humanity must spread to the stars. Here’s another verse that is in the book just before Acorn is attacked. I think is quite appropriate for our election year.

Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears. To be led by a fool is to be led by the opportunists who control the fool. To be led by a thief is to offer up your most precious treasures to be stolen. To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies. To be led by a tyrant is to sell yourself and those you love into slavery.

Back in November I wrote about the first book:

Butler said she had taken the condition of the country in the early 1990s and projected the prevailing forces out to their logical end. She then set the story in ... 2024. As in next [now this] year. At the time it was published critics declared it to be farfetched, especially in such a short timeline. They said civilization can’t collapse that quickly. More recent critics, with the benefit of 25 years of history, said: Oh, that’s how.

Our own nasty guy isn’t a Christian (or at least is quite bad at following Christian principles). Otherwise he is quite similar to Jarrett. But the nasty guy has Christian Nationalist friends who are like Jarrett. For example... Last Tuesday Hunter of Daily Kos wrote about Russell Vought. He was budget director under the nasty guy and current president of the Center for Renewing America, pushing for the adoption of Christian Nationalism. He also has an advisory role in Project 2025 being developed by the Heritage Foundation as a guide on how the next Republican president can become dictator. Bucks County Beacon journalist Jennifer Cohn uncovered documents from CRA claiming to be a draft Statement of Christian Nationalism & the Gospel. Hunter summarized:

The self-described Christian nationalists defining the term don’t envision some ambiguous version of "religious freedoms" that need to be protected. Instead, they are demanding our nation's government be torn down and replaced with a version in which their preferred "Church" will ordain public servants who will enforce Christian theocratic law and "squelch" any Americans who engage in "disobedience" against their plan, which is written in plain English. It's a plan for violence-minded theocratic rule that’s little different from the one Iranians are victims of. It also mirrors what conservative religious extremists have long frothed about as the supposed future non-Christian Americans have been trying to bring about, simply by existing.

These are the people near the nasty guy who say, if reelected, he has full authority to shape the government in their vision. Republicans are enthusiastically endorsing it. Yeah, all that sounds like Andrew Steele Jarrett. Last Monday Mark Sumner of Kos posted what looks to be the start of a regular series of “stories to know.” One of these stories is the one by the Bucks County Beacon with the implied question of why isn’t the rest of the news media ignoring this story. It should be on page one! Another story Sumner mentioned is from Talking Points Memo and is about the Society for American Civic Renewal that is not secret in their discussion of a “national divorce” also known as a second Civil War. No surprise they have strong opinions on race and sexual orientation. And we can easily guess what those opinions are. A third story to mention is about something Liz Cheney and the nasty guy agree, amazing as that sounds. They agree that the current Republican Party belongs to the nasty guy and those he pushes out will need a new party. Thom Hartmann of the Kos community started a post with a serious question by comedian Noel Casler:

How come everything the Republican Party stands for involves other people dying?

Hartmann then listed 27 thing that are worse in Republican controlled states. The list includes spousal abuse, obesity, smoking, teen pregnancy, abortion, bankruptcies and poverty, homicide, infant mortality, divorce, contaminated water, opiate addiction and deaths, unskilled workers, wealth inequality, homelessness, unemployment, and people on disability.

Is there something in the GOP’s core beliefs and strategies that just inevitably leads to these outcomes? It turns out that’s very much the case: these terrible outcomes are the direct result of policies promoting greed and racism that the GOP has been using for forty+ years to get access to billions of dollars and win elections. Using racism as a political strategy while promoting and defending the greed of oligarchs always leads to widespread poverty, pollution, ignorance, and death regardless of the nation it’s done in. We’ve seen it over and over again around the world: it’s happening today in India, The Philippines, Brazil, Russia, and Hungary, for example. And the GOP has spent the past 40+ years marinating itself in both.

Hartmann then gave a history, going back 60 years, back to presidential candidate Barry Goldwater refusing to support the Civil Rights Act. Then came Nixon’s Southern Strategy. Add to that using abortion as a campaign issue in the 1980s as the Republican Party began to combine with religious conservatives. Then came demonization of liberals, and attacks on science and on public education. The other big thread in this history was Reagan’s embrace of oligarchs – him giving them tax cuts, them giving him donations now called “free speech.”

The result of this whole sad history is that Red states have been turned into sacrifice zones for Reagan’s racial and religious bigotry and the neoliberal raise-up-the-rich and crap-on-unions economic policies he inflicted on America.