I will myself to be happy, therefore I am

My Sunday movie was Indian Horse. It is the story of Saul Indian Horse, an indigenous man. The story opens in 1959 when the Canadian residential school system is still going strong. A similar school system was still in use in the US. At age six Saul’s family tries to protect him from being abducted and sent to a school. But their protection fails. A good chunk of the movie is about the cruelty of the priests and nuns who ran this particular school and all like it – a case of using God to justify oppression. A younger priest suggests building a hockey rink for the older boys. Saul is entranced by the game. He’s given the chore of maintaining the rink and secretly teaches himself to skate and handle a hockey stick. Though he’s not allowed to play because he’s too young, he soon shows he’s as good or better than the older boys. At one point Saul says the only thing they really teach at the school is how to endure. Hockey is how he endures. He’s good enough he is allowed to leave the school and be part of a small town league, then a minor league team with a chance at the majors. There he finds that too many white people think the game is theirs and shouldn’t be open to a native. They makes sure he knows that. This can be a difficult story to watch, but it’s an important one. The actors, including the kids, do a fine job. Overall, it’s a good movie. A few days ago I wrote about a post by Kos of Daily Kos who speculated that Republicans are sufficiently annoyed and tired of the nasty guy that enough would vote to remove him after the Democratic led House impeached him. My friend and debate partner disagreed, saying the chance of Republicans going along with this is “probably zero.” He wrote:

If [removal] did happen, it could accelerate the administration's march to fascism. Otherwise his toadies and sycophants (who lack immunity) face prison. Trump got this boulder rolling; but removing him still leaves it in motion. We need determined, steady effort to brake and break up this horror. That will take teaching and time.

I agree with my friend. Removing the nasty guy puts the vice nasty in power and many have said he is more fascist. At the very least the nasty guy isn’t very smart and is guided by his need to constantly prop up his ego, but the vice nasty is reasonably smart and would be more purposeful in working towards fascist goals. Also, removing just the nasty guy does nothing to curb the power of the billionaires and their hold over the Republican – and Democratic – parties. We’re not out of this threat until their power is neutralized.

The work ahead is for Congress and allies to denounce, investigate, impede, litigate and legislate to contain Trump and his fascists, fiscally starve their programs, slow and reverse the damage and assert a new American devotion to the Constitution, the rule of law, freedom and democracy.

The legislate part faces the nasty guy’s veto. As for the rest so far Democrats haven’t shown much spine in actually doing those things. I hope that when Democrats take over the House (hopefully the Senate too!) they begin the work on all those other things. But that will require a change in party leadership, sidelining all those beholden to billionaires. Will enough progressives be elected to force the issue? That means the breaking up of this horror and the teaching required to do so will have to be done by us. My friend and debate partner ended with:

I'm thinking the $5,000 "promise" is either fraud or bribery. Both are federal felonies. Since the "promise" was made to about 270 million adult US citizens, this amounts to 270 million felonies -- surely a world record! (CNN is my source for the 270 million figure.)

Ooh! I like that reasoning! The phrase “Live, Laugh, Love” now appears on coffee mugs and bumper stickers. NPR's Juana Summers talked with Kristin Kobez Du Mez about her new book Live Laugh Love: The Secret History of White Christian Women and the World They Made. The meaning behind the phrase both serves and harms women. The phrase goes back to 1875 and the book The Christian's Secret Of A Happy Life by Hannah Whithall Smith. Essentially, if one aligns their will with the will of God, believes and doesn’t doubt and keeps a positive attitude, then one will become holy and happiness will follow. For women, at least white women, aligning their will with the will of God means totally submitting to the men around them – their husband and their pastor. That will lead to happiness. That didn’t work for Smith either. She had to redefine happiness from an emotion to an act of will, “I will myself to be happy, therefore, I am.” Millions of women are taught they must trust the men, obey, even sacrifice their own well-being. God requires it and they will be blessed. They are taught to defend the authority of those God place over them. That means they have a hard time identifying abuse and certainly won’t speak out against it. The victims that complain tend to get pushed out of the community. This is why they vote conservatively. They are taught to uphold power structures, including authoritarian power. This seems contradictory when these women are immersed in a culture of love and positivity. The logic is that the pure feminine innocence must be protected from evil. That may require violence, but it will be righteous violence. Du Mez also talked about the compassionate conservatism that was popular during the Bush II reign. In the last 10-15 years that has been replaced with the idea that compassion should not be shown to the disobedient to the Christian or American project. We’re not surprised that includes LGBTQ people and immigrants. This ideology is absorbed more readily if women are teaching it. So, women can be out in public and involved in politics, even religion, as long as they stay within the ideology. I listened to this and thought about how women are taught to uphold the hierarchy – with themselves in a lower position – by telling them that God requires it. The God of love is being used to oppress, which is never love. I’ve written many times about Matthew, chapter 25, in the Bible that talks about what God requires of us – love and care for your neighbor as yourself and even the stranger is your neighbor. That’s it. As part of a discussion with my sister I realized Christians are very good at redefining what God wants – obedience and holiness are just a couple of diversions – so that we can avoid caring for our neighbor and still claim to be on the right side of God. Bill in Portland, Maine, in his Cheers and Jeers column for Kos discussed the nasty guy’s offer to pay $5,000 to every adult if Republicans maintain control of both the House and Senate.

But I do have a few questions, Mr. President. When you say “every adult citizen”… Does that include the Dumocrats? Does that include the sex criminals? ... Does that include the woke? The LGBTQ? The feminists and pagans? Does that include men with low testosterone and women with their original hair and faces? Does that include Republicans who vote Democrat? Does that include Jimmy Kimmel?

The list includes many more people and categories. Walter Einenkel of Kos reported that Mitch McConnell made an appearance at the Senate after three months of people wondering whether he had died. The response was mild, though he did fuel a lot of memes. In Monday’s pundit roundup for Kos Greg Dworkin included a campaign ad from James Talarico, the Democrat trying to win the Senate seat in Texas. He essentially says a member of Congress is supposed to serve the people, not themselves. In the comments rugbymom posted a tweet by the Adam Hamilton campaign. He is a liberal United Methodist pastor (I’ve read at least one of his books) running as a Democrat for the Senate from Kansas and just might flip the seat. The tweet contains a video of Hamilton’s closing argument at a debate at the Kansas state fair against Roger Marshall. The characters of The Wizard of Oz want a heart, a brain, and courage. These are three things Republicans don’t have – their votes show they don’t have a heart, they don’t talk to constituents and don’t understand them showing they don’t have a brain, and they don’t have the courage to stand up to the nasty guy. Hamilton puts his preacher training to good use to lay all this out. In the comments of today’s roundup are a few good tweets and memes. A tweet from Andy Craig:

Great system where the body with the power to declare, fund, and authorize wars can repeatedly vote "we don't approve of this war, stop it" and it has no effect.

A meme posted by exlrrp and from Call to Activism:

The entire Republican Party just let the president try and undermine our Constitution and prevent eligible voters from making their voices heard in this election. The Supreme Court said No F---ing Way. Corruption lost and the law won!

Also posted by exlrrp is a campaign sign:

TRUMP $20.28 per gallon

What if society was based on spiritual values, not property?

What if society was based on spiritual values, not property? I finished two books today. When I get to the second one I’ll explain how that happened. They also fit well together. The first book is The Peacekeeper by B. L. Blanchard. What attracted me to this book is the setting – North America (actually the whole world) not colonized by Europe. The time is 2020 (thought the first chapter begins with the date in many calendar systems). Many of our modern conveniences exist in this world with smartphones being the most obvious. There are also high speed trains (cars aren’t mentioned), living skyscrapers, and modern forensic science. The skyscrapers are designed with space for trees on balconies (yes, this is a real thing, see here for an example). The story follows Chibenashi, resident of the small tourist town of Baawitigong (near what we know of as Sault Ste. Marie). When he was seventeen his mother was murdered and his father way too quickly confessed to the crime and asked to be sent to prison. That left him to care for his sister Ashwiyaa, twelve at the time. She didn’t handle the loss of her parents and goes frantic or almost catatonic whenever anyone but Chibenashi cares for her. The one exception is Meoquanee, their mother’s best friend whose own husband and son deserted her. Twenty years later Meoquanee is murdered. Chibenashi is now a peacekeeper, the equivalent of a policeman, though their small community doesn’t need much policing. He is assigned to the case, which brings up ties to the previous murder. To help solve the case Chibenashi must go to the big city, Shikaakwa, on the southwest shore of Ininwewi-gichigami (Lake Michigan). That makes me wonder if the huge city at that location in our world derived its name from a native name. This is the place with the living skyscrapers. It has much more sophisticated police force and forensic tools. It is also where his father is in prison. So, yeah, this is a murder mystery. The author is very good at introducing new information that upends what Chibenashi (and the reader) understood up to that time. Alas, Chibenashi is too emotionally involved in the case. It’s a good mystery. It is also a good way to describe what North America might have been like if natives had kept control. I’ve mentioned the living skyscrapers. There are city layouts that incorporate a great deal more nature. There is a description of an alternate justice system, based on restoring (as much as possible) the victim rather than punishing the perpetrator. Instead of lawyers and judges there are advocates and mediators. One of the characters is an economics professor and he is given a chance to expound on how their economic system differs from capitalism and communism. Their system is based more on community and on the idea that a person or community gives of their surplus with the hope their needs are met by other people or communities giving of their surplus. I very much enjoyed this story and towards the end didn’t want to put it down. I usually don’t like mysteries (the story is about a death), but the description of the society the author created was well worth the read. The mystery, plot, and characters were pretty good too. I recommend it. On to the second book. It is Native Wisdom for White Minds, Daily Reflections Inspired by the Native Peoples of the World by Anne Wilson Shaef. In the past I’ve used Christian daily devotion guides that have a page for each day of the year. Each page has a Bible verse, a writer’s commentary on it, and a prayer. This is similar. Each page has a sentence or more of wisdom from a native community, Shaef’s reflection on it, and her prayer. The wisdom comes from American natives, Hawaiian Kupuna, Australian aborigines, the Maori of New Zealand, South American natives, even the Irish. Yeah, I’m writing about it at the end of January, rather than the beginning, because there were many days I forgot to open it. Even with doubling up towards the end of the year I still didn’t finish it until now. I found the book 18 moths ago in the Indigenous shop in Stratford, Ontario. The title intrigued me, so I bought it (and a couple other books on native themes I’ve since read). During the year I wrote down on an index card the dates and topics of thoughts that intrigued me. By the end of the book I had filled the card. I can’t share all of them, but I will share many. For some I quoted the native speaker, for others I quote Shaef’s reflection, and in a few I wrote a summary. You don’t need to ask me permission to quote something I have written or said. We are both doing the work of the Creator. Our responsibility is to get the information out there. Use whatever you like. – Don Coyhis, Mohican American native. Shaef added: Possession is an illusion. Western society (especially American evangelicals) focus on the family of a man, a woman, and children. Native wisdom says that is too narrow. Children benefit from having a community of aunties, uncles, and siblings. Why is it that right now Western governments are increasingly pushing the isolated nuclear family [rather than the extended family and community] as society’s building blocks? – Shaef Also on the nuclear family: Some of us are even beginning to wonder why our societal structures keep pushing for a model that produces damaged individuals. – Shaef “We” overrides “me.” – Hawaiian proverb. Shaef added that many of the laws in Western culture actually work against community. Everything in the universe is perfect. People and anything else only become less than perfect when compared to someone or something else. – Rangimarie Turuki Pere, Maori Too many times we use the word “illiterate” to describe people who are not formally educated in Western science and culture but understand the world and its wisdom much better than Western culture does. Sometimes it’s difficult for “civilized” people of the world to believe that “primitive” people can look at our way of life with all its advantages and not want it. It’s even more difficult to believe that they find our way of life not only undesirable but primitive. – Shaef Earth, water, and sea belong to the gods and people are here to enhance them, not deplete them. – Hawaiian Kupuna When we realize that we are, indeed, one with others, we become less willing to destroy them, because we understand that we are, in essence, destroying ourselves. – Shaef. We work volunteer – you could never get people to work this hard if you paid them for it. – Bruce Stewart, Maori Hawaii works for personal excellence, the West works for money. – Patrick Ka’ano’i, Hawaii One must have a good heart and a good mind and use both. Much of Western culture is built on exclusion. Native culture is built on inclusion. Perhaps only when people can enjoy their differences as a resource of cultural enrichment do they become truly civilized. – Herb Kawainui Kane, Kupuna Only a system that believes it has the right, yea, even the mandate, to dominate and control (and often destroy) would have the arrogance to see a people who live every moment of their lives in deep spirituality as “wicked and unsaved.” – Shaef No one needs help to get into trouble. – Maori proverb. Status is gained by mobilizing and redistributing wealth, not by hoarding capital. – Patricia Kinloch, Health Services researcher in Samoa Many Westerners are too busy trying to impose our culture to let ourselves be happy. How can people say one skin is colored when each has its own coloration? What should it matter that one bowl is dark and the other pale, if each is of good design and serves its purpose well? – Elizabeth Q. White, Hopi, American native Only when we have a religion that is a closed system that cannot tolerate the existence of other systems do we have to legislate controls. Closed systems are by nature controlling and are threatened by open systems. Open systems are not threatened by closed systems because all are allowed existence. – Shaef. It seems [white people] have something in their life called gravy. They know truth but it is buried under thickening and spices of convenience, materialism, insecurity, and fear. – Australian aboriginal On missionaries: We cannot read their book – they tell us different stories about what it contains, and we believe they make the book talk to suit themselves. If we had no money, no land and no country to be cheated out of, these black coats would not trouble themselves about our good hereafter. The Great Spirit will not punish us for what we do not know. – Red Jacket, Seneca, American native A good thing sells itself. A bad thing is advertized. – Swahili proverb In the Western world we have capitalism, communism, and socialism, and all are based upon economics. What would a society look like that is based upon spiritual values instead of property? – Schaef In Western culture, we seem to have set up a dualism: I do what is good for the community/I have to deny myself. Native people do not operate out of that dualism. Their worldview moves them from the individual to the community to the whole. – Shaef Each person is known to have a certain gift and certain ability, and is therefore able to make a contribution to the whole. There will be the expert in bone carving; the expert in weaving, but there is in the extended family a place for all. – Hiwi Tauroa, Maori One important belief is that the Creator has given a unique heritage to each and every culture across the world. No culture is more or less important than another – to suggest that there is, is to criticize the Creator. – Rangimarie Turuki Pere, Maori

Media isn't reporting Helene hit Tennessee too

My Sunday movie was Heartstopper season 3, episodes 4-6. I’ll write about the plot, which could be a spoiler. Then I’ll write about my thoughts on what I saw. At the end of episode 3 Charlie admitted he needed help with an eating disorder. So episode 4 is about the start of treatment. But there are delays and his mood gets worse. Charlie does get into a residential program for two months. We see that time first through Nick’s eyes. He’s lonely without his boyfriend, especially at Halloween. Then we see the two months through Charlie’s eyes, working with a therapist, getting a care package from friends, and a visit from family and Nick. In episode 5 Charlie is home in time for Christmas. And it is his first big test. His extended family is there – including the people that are invited out of obligation. And some of them pull out the mental illness stereotypes. After a while Charlie escapes to Nick’s house because Nick doesn’t treat him as mentally ill. Nick is doing a good job incorporating all that his aunt taught him about how to be supportive. In episode 6 it is now spring. Charlie’s therapy is progressing well and his relationship with Nick deepens. Part of that is Charlie has more mental space to devote to his love. Ellie is doing well in art school and her art is getting noticed. She is offered a radio interview. The host wants to draw her into the controversies of being trans. Then the story shifts to Charlie’s 16th birthday party. Now my thoughts: This circle of friends is quite supportive in all the right ways. When I was a teen I didn’t know how to be supportive like that. Perhaps the author used the stories as a guide to teens in how to be supportive. Through the first two seasons most of the emotions were pretty happy. The actors had it rather easy. In season three we see much more difficult situations. And I can see the actors are quite good. The characters are supposed to be 15 and 16 but act more like they’re older than 18, and I’m sure the actors are well into their 20s. There is way too much alcohol for kids who are 16 (probably too much for kids who are 18). And it wasn’t just Charlie’s birthday party – there was too much alcohol at the Halloween party, which Nick attended alone, and at the New Year’s Eve party when Charlie was 15. For characters and intended audience this young I wish the book author and show writers had come up with a different way for them to party. Observers have noticed that over the last few months people have been leaving the nasty guy’s rallies before they were over. Kos of Daily Kos reported his campaign has found a way to make them stay. And, of course, it didn’t turn out well. The nasty guy held a rally in the desert in Coachella, California. This is the town of the famous music festival that draws a quarter million fans. But the nasty guy didn’t use that venue. He held it at a private ranch. A question I won’t bother answering: With California absolutely going for Harris why is the nasty guy wasting campaign time there? But onward. For this rally attendees parked in three designated locations and shuttled to the venue by bus. Some started showing up at 6am. The rally ended at 7pm, meaning the crowd, limited to 15K, had spent the day in the hot sun. Well after 10pm thousands of people were still waiting for buses to take them back to their cars. At the venue there is no longer food or water or restroom facilities. A walk to the parking lot would take two hours and many elderly can’t walk that far. Some said the busses ran out of fuel. Even if they did Kos showed several gas stations just a couple miles from the site. Kos said the crowd response got weird. Some posting about the situation blamed the mayor, who had nothing to do with the event. Others posted and felt they had to delete the posts because they were “causing drama” – they were making the nasty guy look bad and devotees objected. Kos wrote:

Having stranded thousands in the hot desert, Trump and his campaign can’t even be bothered to issue an apology to their own people. They were used, abused, and tossed aside.

But they didn’t leave the rally early. Oliver Willis of Kos reported:

On Saturday, federal agencies were forced to move employees assisting with hurricane recovery efforts in North Carolina following reports of a militia threat against the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The incident follows days of Donald Trump and his allies in conservative media promoting lies about Hurricane Helene and the federal response. ... “FEMA has advised all federal responders Rutherford County, NC, to stand down and evacuate the county immediately,” the Post quoted from the email, adding that recipients were advised that the National Guard “had come across x2 trucks of armed militia saying there were out hunting FEMA” and that the agency was “coordinating the evacuation of all assigned personnel in that county.”

Willis also reported Jake Tapper, host of The Lead on CNN, did a segment on the definition of fascism and that the nasty guy fit that description. Tapper quoted Merriam-Webster:

a populist political philosophy, movement, or regime that exalts nation and often race above the individual, that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, and that is characterized by severe economic and social regimentation and by forcible suppression of opposition

Tapper’s evidence included: + Declaring there is “the enemy from within” and that he said he would consider using the US military or National Guard to go after opponents. + Gen. Mark Milley, who had been chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for the nasty guy, was quoted in Bob Woodward’s interview of saying the nasty guy was “fascist to the core.” + The Capitol attack. + His verbal attacks on FEMA leading to threats of physical attacks. In the comments of a pundit roundup is a meme posted by Ridin’ With Kamala: “All I want for Christmas is to never hear his voice again.” In a pundit roundup for Kos Chitown Kev quoted David Faris of Slate, who would like to get rid of the Electoral College. The EC is bad in more than distorting democracy, but also the distribution of federal aid and even distorting news.

While it appears the Biden administration is treating the impact of this season’s hurricanes as it should, the media’s focus on the almost unfathomable catastrophe in the western mountains of swing state North Carolina is a stark contrast to the near-total absence of attention to what’s going on just over the state line in deep-red Tennessee—complete with the obligatory analyses of how the hurricane’s aftermath might impact the outcome in the Tar Heel State. As for the electoral impact of Helene in Tennessee, no one is asking and no one cares. That kind of coverage disparity is an almost inevitable consequence of swing-state mania, and we shouldn’t be surprised when it seeps into policy decisions.

Down in the comments are several cartoons noting Columbus Day. In the comments of another pundit roundup are several cartoons making the repurposing of Columbus Day as Indigenous Peoples Day. Mark Fiore posted one of his cartoons from two years ago. It shows a girl writing a poem for class:

In 1492 Columbus Sailed the ocean blue. He tortured & killed the people he found, Brought slavery & genocide all the world around. An inept explorer who left thousands dead, it’s why we celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day instead.

A meme posted by Hugh Jim Bissell shows a native chief saying, “Let me get this straight. You’re afraid of refugees coming to America, killing you, and taking your property?” Bissel also posted a meme showing the Capitol attack and saying, “Catching people sneaking across the border won’t make us safer when these people are already here.” Sharon Lerner and Andy Kroll, in an article for ProPublica posted on Kos, reported:

Three investigators for the Heritage Foundation have deluged federal agencies with thousands of Freedom of Information Act requests over the past year, requesting a wide range of information on government employees, including communications that could be seen as a political liability by conservatives. Among the documents they’ve sought are lists of agency personnel and messages sent by individual government workers that mention, among other things, “climate equity,” “voting” or “SOGIE,” an acronym for sexual orientation, gender identity and expression. The Heritage team filed these requests even as the think tank’s Project 2025 was promoting a controversial plan to remove job protections for tens of thousands of career civil servants so they could be identified and fired if Donald Trump wins the presidential election.

There may be as many as 50,000 requests submitted over the past two years. They are asking for calendar dumps, team messages that include the designated phrases, and communications with civil rights and voting rights groups. The requests, which sometimes “come in at a rate of one a second,” do indeed interfere with the ability to do the regular job. Gumming up government functions may be a secondary goal. The primary goal is to identify the government employees that should be purged if the nasty guy gets back in the Oval Office and begins to implement Project 2025, giving him space to install loyalists throughout the government. Michael Harriot, in a thread now in Threadreader, wrote about the importance of black barbershops. They’re a combination of church, political headquarters, secret hideout, and gathering spot. They are one of “the most important, most revolutionary institutions in Black history.” Their history is as old as America. When a slave was about to be sold they needed cleaning up. A white barber wouldn’t do it, so they hired a black “barber boy.” They could earn enough to buy their freedom and open their own business. The barbershop was one of the few places where black people could talk freely without white people around. Black barbers were held in high esteem, which meant they could fund and be a part of the Underground Railroad. Having a barber in the effort meant a slave’s appearance could be altered before they were passed along the route. Black barbers also taught black people how to read. They could also become quite rich and important to a community. In the early 1880s Philadelphia was at the center of the Abolition movement. Black people built schools and the first HBCUs. The AME church was founded there. There was also an abolitionist newspaper. When a delegate was chosen fot the first National Negro Convention they didn’t send a leader of any of those institutions, they sent a black barber, Joseph Cassey, who was also the second richest man in the city. He had funded some of those institutions. Also during that time a black man was the barber to the president (which one is not named). He is reported to have influence over his customer. A network of barbers organized a National Slave Revolt. By 1860 they had 42,000 people trained and ready. The revolt didn’t happen because the Civil War happened instead. Barbers were instrumental during the Civil Rights era. If you are trying to influence the black community or want to get elected you need to visit a black barbershop.

It’s simple. They love each other.

My Sunday movie was Join or Die. To see it I had to go to a theater and watch with other people. Cinema Detroit is one of two remaining art-house movie organizations in Metro Detroit. The other is Detroit Film Theater, which is quite healthy and celebrating 50 years. It is also attached to the Detroit Institute of Arts. The area has lost two art-house theaters, the Main in Royal Oak (now demolished) and the Maple in West Bloomfield. Even Cinema Detroit has given up its permanent home. It now sponsors movies about twice a month at Planet Ant in Hamtramck. Planet Ant has a variety of other types of programs, including improv theater and standup comedy. I hadn’t been there before and I’ve rarely visited Hamtramck, so this was a bit of an adventure. The hall had seats for perhaps 100 people. I think about 30 people watched the movie. Join or Die is a documentary about the need for citizens to join clubs. It is based on ideas that Robert Putnam has developed over the last fifty years. In the 1970s Italy decentralized its government, less power in Rome and more in the states. This became an ideal time for Putnam and other researchers to study why some state governments did well and others did not. They studied a lot of parameters, including wealth and education. They found the parameter that correlated best was civic engagement. This wasn’t just civic engagement in government, just civic engagement in general. The idea is much older and others have called it social capital. One of those others is Jane Jacobs, a name my friend and debate partner knows – he lent me her book The Death and Life of Great American Cities (I wrote about the book here and a documentary about her here). She studied the street scene in American cities and showed the best neighborhoods were the ones that fostered interconnectedness between people. The social capital was what was lost when a neighborhood was destroyed for “urban renewal.” Social capital essentially means we do better when we join a club. Of any kind. Even religious clubs are good – churches provided about half of our civic engagement. Though all are good try to join a club with membership that has a wide variety of people. Unions are good. So are Parent Teacher Associations. We do better personally – those who join a club are about 50% more likely to live longer (I don’t remember the exact nature of this statistic). Being in a club is also a great benefit to the community and the nation, even for the quality of democracy. Back in the US Putnam turned his analysis skills to his homeland. In 1995 he wrote an article he titled Bowling Alone. People were bowling just as much, maybe more, than they were in the 1950s and 60s. But there was a lot less bowling in leagues. That caught the attention of President Bill Clinton, who invited Putnam to do a few presentations. Other people dismissed his conclusion, saying he didn’t look in the right places. So over the next five years he looked in every place he could. All of the studies he found showed the same decline in civic participation. He put all of that into this book Bowling Alone that came out in 2000. An important question Putnam needed to answer in the book is: Why? Why has there been such a dropoff in all aspects of public participation? He uncovered three broad areas that contribute to less public life. The first is television and its successor social media. The second, related to the first, is how hard people have to work to get by and how they don’t want to go to some club in the evening. They would much rather plop in front of the screen. The hard work is related to growing inequality. Which leads us to the third part. There are forces in America that don’t want us in clubs whose existence supports democracy. They promote rugged individuality so that we say we are not joiners. Putnam has been speaking out to get people to join clubs for nearly thirty years. He’s been helped by Pete Buttigieg and Hillary Clinton (both appear in the film). Yet the trend remains downward and the pandemic made things worse by closing a lot of clubs. It’s enough to make a guy lose hope. Putnam went digging again through a lot of different archives. The charts in his book all showed descending lines from 1960. What about before then? Ah. From the late 1800s – America’s Gilded Age when corporate barons reigned supreme – to about 1960, participation in clubs climbed by quite a bit. We’ve done it before. We can do it again. And there are signs that we are doing it again. The movie highlighted several. That does not mean the 1950s were an ideal time, that we should go back to what our society was like then, that we should be sending women back to the kitchen. But to keep our fragile democracy and to move forward people need to form and join clubs. Some of the ideas for clubs may not last. And some will. I read a couple reviews of this movie (IMDb has links). They point to a question not covered in the movie. All groups are beneficial? Even hate groups? Or groups with discriminatory membership rules? I finished the book The Reason You Walk by Wab Kinew. The author is Anishinaabe and grew up in northwest Ontario, north of Minnesota. I bought the book while at the Stratford Festival in Stratford, Ontario. The Indigenous shop featured this book and a few more in addition to the Indigenous tourist art and fine art. If the other books I bought there are any good I’ll discuss them eventually. The story centers around Kinew’s father, Tobasonakwut, frequently referred to in the book as Ndede, which is Ojibwe for daddy. The story begins with the birth of Tobasonakwut in the 1940s, then his time in the residential schools that have been in the Canadian news quite a bit over the last decade due to the graves of children found on many school sites. The purpose of these schools was to “kill the Indian in the child” and replace it with white culture. The one Tobasonakwut was taken to was run by the Catholic Church, as were many of the schools. That means Tobasonakwut was raised by people who did not love him, who frequently abused him. He grew up to be a strong and angry young man. That anger affected the family – Tobasonakwut didn’t know how to love and treated people the way he had been treated. For a while he wrecked relationships and lives. Because of that Kinew also grew up angry and also damaged relationships. Tobasonakwut and Kinew immersed themselves in Anishinaabe culture, the sundances and powwows. And they began to heal. Also during this time various Indigenous movements developed and Tobasonakwut and Kinew were a part of them. The Canadian government officially apologized for the residential schools. The government set up a Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Tobasonakwut gave his testimony in Ojibwe. Kinew was offered a job with the Canadian Broadcast Corporation and was instrumental in creating documentaries about the schools and Indigenous life. He became known across the country. Tobasonakwut also worked to reconcile with the Catholic Church. He was met halfway (the church didn’t quite give up its superior attitude), enough that Tobasonakwut and a willing Archbishop of Winnepeg conducted an Anishinaabe ceremony declaring they were brothers. They achieved much in advancing acceptance of Indigenous people. There is still a long way to go. The Ndede got cancer. Kinew took a leave of absence from the CBC to learn as much about Anishinaabe culture from his father as he could in the time remaining. Through that he learned what a remarkable man his father was. Ndede had learned how to forgive. As for the title:

Ndede had explained that there are four layers of meaning to these words. They are from the perspective of the creator, as though God himself were singing to you. The first meaning of “I am the reason you walk” is “I have created you and therefore you walk.” The second meaning is “I am your motivation.” The third meaning is “I am the spark inside you called love, which animates you and allows you to live by the Anishinaabe values of kiizhewaatiziwin.” The fourth and final meaning is “I am the destination at the end of your life that you are walking toward.”

It’s a beautiful and amazing story. I highly recommend it. A few years ago this book was a part of Canada Reads, a program that tries to get the whole nation to read and discuss the same book. From that height we descend to the depths. Yesterday, Mark Sumner of Daily Kos reported that Speaker Johnson has two weeks to fund the government to avoid a shutdown. Chuck Schumer in the Senate says he needs a week to get any bill through his chamber. So Johnson really has only a week. Last week Johnson pulled a funding bill because he couldn’t get enough Republicans to vote for it. This week he brought the same bill back. It includes a racist provision that demands proof of citizenship before being allowed to register to vote. Democrats in the House won’t vote for it. Democrats in the Senate will remove it, which will require time to reconcile with the House. But Johnson can’t get enough Republicans to approve the bill with the racist language and can’t get approval without it. Of course, the nasty guy is in the background demanding the racist language be included. Johnson could take it out and let Democrats bail him out. Again. And again weaken his standing in his caucus. And on Monday Sumner reported that the nasty guy can’t admit he lost his debate with Harris. So Republicans, eager to please him, are calling for an investigation into the debate. They even say they have a whistleblower, though can’t decide whether he is dead or alive (though likely never existed). They want to investigate important issues – at least as important as those around the Biden impeachment scandals that never produced evidence. They claim ABC, who ran the event, had given Harris the questions ahead of time (no, she simply prepared well). They claim Harris wore a wire in her earrings. They claim ABC was biased towards Harris because they didn’t fact-check her while they did him. Thus ABC should lose its license.

Trump’s real problem is that he’s a loser who never wants to admit he lost. That was true in 2020, and it’s still true today. To cover up his losing, Trump employs a three-part plan: insist in advance that his opponents will cheat, claim to have won no matter how badly he lost, and then spread conspiracy theories about why he lost.

And out of the depths. In a pundit roundup for Kos Chitown Kev had a couple good quotes. The first is from Christopher Kane of the Washington Blade who did the “first-ever interview by a LGBTQ newspaper with a sitting President of the United States.”

Through to today, Biden said, “most of the openly gay people that have worked with me, that I’ve worked with, the one advantage they have is they tend to have more courage than most people have.” “No, I’m serious,” he added, “I think you guys underestimate that.” The president has spoken publicly about his deep respect and admiration for LGBTQ people, including the trans community, and trans youth, whom he has repeatedly said are some of the bravest people he knows. A record-breaking number of LGBTQ officials are serving in appointed positions throughout the Biden-Harris administration. Among them are Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, the first openly gay Senate-confirmed Cabinet member; Rachel Levine, the highest-ranking transgender appointee in history, who serves as assistant secretary for health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; the first out White House communications director and press secretary, Ben LaBolt and Karine Jean-Pierre; and 11 federal judges (the same number of LGBTQ judicial nominees who were confirmed during the Obama-Biden administration’s two terms).

I had to go read the whole Washington Blade article. It’s a great one. Mostly, it is about Biden discussing the importance of the many LGBTQ initiatives he accomplished during his term, and a few that didn’t get done. This is a good quote:

“My dad used to say that everyone’s entitled to be treated with dignity,” the president said, recalling a story he has shared before about a time when, as a teenager, he was surprised by the sight of two men kissing in downtown Wilmington, Del., and his father responded, “Joey, it’s simple. They love each other.”

Back to the roundup. Kev quoted Paul Krugman of the New York Times writing about small cities, like Springfield, Ohio.

I’ve written before about the problem of regions left behind by the 21st-century economy, a problem that is common to many wealthy nations. Decline in parts of the former East Germany has fed right-wing extremism in ways that resemble the rise of Trumpism in some depressed parts of our country. There are, however, some small cities that have managed to buck the trend; and in quite a few cases immigrants have been central to their revival. Springfield, with its community of (legal!) Haitian migrants is one example. Other examples include my hometown, Utica, N.Y., buoyed by refugees from Bosnia and Myanmar; Springdale, Ark., which has attracted people from various places including the Marshall Islands; and many others. [...] Why do immigrants move to some small cities? Partly in response to housing costs that were, at least until recently, relatively low (as they tend to be in declining cities). In some instances, they also move to take advantage of jobs that some native-born Americans, for whatever reasons, are reluctant to do. In Springdale, the home of Tyson Foods, these are often jobs in poultry plants. In Springfield, which, The Times reported, has seen “a boom in manufacturing and warehouse jobs,” employers suggest that some young native-born adults shun “entry-level, rote work.”

In the comments are several good cartoons. One is about the woman who started the rumor of Haitians in Springfield eating pets and now admits it is false and regrets the story that grew up around it and the trouble it created. Garthtoons show a man and woman talking:

Man: Wait. So you’re saying I don’t need to proclaim my stance on breaking news within moments of it happening and can wait to get all the facts before proselytizing on social media? Woman: I know, it’s a radical idea.

ayiti libre! Posted a cartoon by Mackay showing a Haitian family dressed in Ukrainian outfits trying to file an asylum claim. Attached to that tweet is one by nawè who wants us to notice who gets labeled “immigrants” and who gets labeled “refugees.” Deborah Kleinhomer posted a cartoon by Joel Pett with the caption, “Diabolical undocumented-immigrant voting schemes.” A man says to his wife, who is holding an infant, “Let’s abandon our families, blow all our money, risk our lives, sneak into the U.S., then commit a crime that will get us sent back!” A cartoon posted by Trumpton contrasts statements by the nasty guy:

"I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose any voters, OK?" Trump 2016 "(Biden and Harris’s) rhetoric is causing me to be shot at, when I am the one who is going to save the country" Trump 2024

And a cartoon by Peter Steiner of a boy talking to his teacher. “The dog ate my book report, and an immigrant ate the dog. But I have a concept for a book report.” Way down in the comments exlrrp posted a photo showing two pickup trucks, one sleek, the other quite beefy. The caption says, “The same make, model, and color. Thirty years apart.”

Who got to take our stuff

Congress used to allow what were called earmarks – designations in spending bills for projects in the lawmaker’s home district. Earmarks were a way to bargain a lawmaker into supporting a spending bill. But the process was abused, such as members slipping items into a bill under the cover of darkness to help a particular corporate donor. The public outcry got loud. So earmarks were banned. They’re back now and called “member-directed spending” along with rules for more transparency to cut down on abuse. A big infrastructure bill is a good and appropriate place for MDS. Joan McCarter of Daily Kos reported that more than 100 House Republicans have requested projects in the current infrastructure bill. They were approved. Yet, many of these same members are bellowing about their opposition to the bill. So, when the bill passes along party lines, these Republicans get a twofer. They get to proclaim their opposition to the bill and they get to brag how much money they’re bringing back to their district through a bill they voted against. Wrote McCarter:

In other words, "my stuff is essential and wonderful but yours is bulls--- and costs too much." But the bill is going to pass anyway without his vote, so who's the sucker here?

McCarter is implying the suckers are the Democrats. On July 2 the NPR show Morning Edition continued a 32 year tradition of reading the Declaration of Independence on a day close to July 4th. This year was slightly different. In addition to reading the full text and in memory of the racial protests over the last year the NPR staff acknowledged the bad parts of the declaration. There’s the famous parts we all learned and remember – the life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness thing – but even in the famous parts is the problematic “all men are created equal.” We usually don’t remember much of the document is a list of grievances against King George III of Britain. Thomas Jefferson wrote it and the Continental Congress edited it. Southerners demanded removal of criticism of the African slave trade. But a reference to “merciless Indian Savages” was kept. David Treuer, who is Ojibwe, was on the show.

But a deeper look at history also shows that one of the reasons why the colonists wanted to rise up against the British — and wage the Revolutionary War — was over the question of who would try to colonize Native lands west of the colonies, Treuer tells Morning Edition. "The crown wanted that money for themselves. The colonists, understandably, would have preferred to have it for themselves. So the whole revolution was in large part fought over who got to take our stuff," he says. He also notes that Native people helped the colonists in the Revolutionary War. "It was the Oneida people who broke the famine at Valley Forge, who taught the revolutionaries with George Washington, how to process Indian corn so that it was digestible and nutritious," he says. "So I think it's safe to say that war would been difficult to win without our help."

Much of the rest of this post is the text of the Declaration divided up by which host or reporter read which part. Cliff Albright, cofounder of Black Voters Matter, tweeted about the recent Supreme Court decision that gutted the last pillar of the Voting Rights Act:

They're *literally* using the same rationales used post-Reconstruction to protect "the purity of the ballot". Regarding racial justice & voting rights in particular, the Roberts Court will be remembered much as the Taney Court & the late 1800s courts that decided Plessy & others.

In a tweet that’s been hiding in my browser tabs for a month, Chuck Modi, justice journalist, wrote:

Most subjective journalists in the world are the ones who claim to be objective, & are usually advocates for existing power. Majority of subjectivity is in: 1—Story Selection 2—Story Framing Even if you play 3–Story Content straight up, most subjectivity has already occurred.

Regionally curated subscription box of artisinal apocalypses

As I mentioned before I switch my radio to the CBC (the national Canadian network) during noon to 3:00 on weekdays. Today was a special program, a day to listen to indigenous voices. That lasted all day, not just the three hours I tuned in. During the news segments they announced a third set of unmarked graves were found at a third residential Indian school. So this day was a time to listen to indigenous voices. That meant stories and music by them. Some of it was the traditional native music I’ve heard. There were also indigenous composers who wrote in the Western Classical idiom, including writing for orchestra. Quite an interesting musical journey. Some of the stories were by people who had lived through the residential school system or had worked to reclaim traditions that were close to being lost to those schools. One person was asked, why don’t you just get over it? She replied, we can’t. More grave sites will be found. It was cool to hear a national radio network lift up indigenous voices, to spend a day listening to those usually unheard. It was cool to hear a part of a national conversation about recognizing injustices done by previous generations. Alas, it wasn’t my nation. Lily Altavena, in last Sunday’s Detroit Free Press, wrote about a couple cities in Michigan whose school board meetings were packed with residents demanding their children not be taught Critical Race Theory. The article is online, but for subscribers only. Of course, what the residents were talking about is the conservative talking points for their definition of CRT that has little to do with how CRT is taught in graduate schools. The talking points included how white children would be oppressed by teaching CRT. These school districts, Grand Ledge and Troy, have equity programs. The irate citizens had been told by conservative sources that these equity programs and CRT were the same thing. School boards had to explain the difference. An equity program wants to make sure all students, including children of color, those learning English, and those with disabilities, get the same opportunities as the white children. It looks at racial disparities and tries to correct them. It increases the use of texts written by people of color. It works to diversify the faculty and staff. It works to equalize the disciplinary practices. It does not declare white students are inherently racist. It does not teach them to hate America or to be ashamed of being white. Those claims of equity programs only serve to inflame parents. The school board meeting in mid June in Grand Ledge got so out of control the meeting was cut short. A week later people talked over one another, but the board managed to keep the meeting going. School boards are not used to this much rancor and chaos. And so much intentional misinterpretation of what they are actually doing. I wrote a while back about Christopher Rufo as the guy who has been pushing the redefinition of Critical Race Theory as a way of bludgeoning liberals. He did this through redefining the term in conservative language, then repeating it until his definition replaced the original. Jason Stanley quoted some of Rufo’s tweets and added:

Some people are out there using my work on propaganda and fascism as a how to guide. I know that Rufo is familiar with my work.

Jeremy Just added:

Every word ever written on totalitarianism - and that’s a lot of words - has been used by these grifters as a how-to guide. If only there was a similar body of work on the many efforts to counter it that have been undertaken over the years. How Counter-Fascism Works…

Joan McCarter of Daily Kos reported that Toyota has donated the most, by far, to insurrectionist lawmakers. The company says it doesn’t judge members based solely their refusal to certify the election. Instead, they donate based on issues important to the auto industry. Besides, there were a few they decided to no longer donate to. Customers are now declaring they will never buy another Prius. And Subaru is looking pretty good. A heat bubble over Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia, and sliding over the Rockies into Alberta. Seven inches of rain in Detroit – one highway was closed for a few days because a pumping station lost electricity and couldn’t pump away the water. The American West is drier than it has been in 1200 years (noted from tree rings). Wildfires in California. Moscow had so much rain subway stations were flooded. Leah McElrath tweeted:

Here’s what I don’t understand: Global warming and the resulting climate crises are affecting everyone. Every nation. All people. There is no where that is immune, no infrastructure that is prepared. Why won’t we work together to treat it like the global emergency it is? Moscow, Portland, NONE of our infrastructure is prepared for what is happening. Global warming isn’t just about temperatures rising. Global warming sets off a cascade of events that result in more intense weather events happening more frequently. The violence of the resulting systems is something no human can hide from. Even those who own survival bunkers.

Daniel Michelsen of the Kos community has started a series of posts about the things we already know how to do to end the climate crisis. That we don’t use them is a political problem. The topic of this post is building insulation. Instead of installing a furnace we could spend the money on enough insulation that the appliances and body heat would keep it warm enough. But we insulate only to the point where the heat costs less than the additional insulation would add to the mortgage. But that assumes three things that aren’t true: 1. Energy costs will never increase, 2. interest rates don’t change, and 3. emissions don’t matter. Thirty years ago when I lived in Germany I attended a house warming for work colleagues. This celebration was done before the new house was finished, well before the family was ready to move in. This house was billed as ecologically friendly. The walls were thick because they enclosed stacked bales of straw. Not a Wolf tweeted:

It’s not climate change, it’s a regionally curated subscription box of artisinal apocalypses. Each month you get a new, bespoke, reminder of the inevitability of our decline delivered straight to your door. For the low cost of blood and your future, you too could be stuck in traffic at the end of all things.

Aysha Qamar of Kos reported Sesame Street is doing its part to combat rising attacks on Asian Americans. In a recent show, Alan, who is Japanese American, and Wes, a black Muppet, talk to Analyn, a Filipino American girl, who was teased about her eyes. Alan and Wes sing a song about being proud of our eyes, that they tell us the story of our family. This is just one part of an ongoing series of scenes tackling bullying and helping families talk about racial justice. Guidance is provided by racial equity groups. A video of the scene is at the bottom of the post. In the comments Nanny Ogg included a video of the recent visit of a girl and her two gay dads to Sesame Street. Alas, this video is only 40 seconds, not the whole scene. At least we see they were there.

Two quite different definitions of democracy

Carolyn Fiddler of Daily Kos reported the highlights of a new Kos/Civiqs poll. It says 87% of those polled are worried the US is becoming less of a democracy. A couple other things in the poll: 52% say transgender youth should get health care that supports their gender identity. 56% recognize people of color face discrimination based on race. 54% of Republicans say white people are treated unfairly because of race. Kerry Eleveld of Kos also looked at the results of the poll, in particular the other questions about democracy. Should America remain a democracy? 93% agree. Are the new voting laws passed by Republicans an attack on democracy or to protect it? 44% say protect, 50% say attack. Are the new voting laws proposed by Democrats an attack on democracy or to protect it? 46% say protect, 43% say attack. We recognize democracy is in trouble, but we’re almost evenly split on what to do about it. One aspect Eleveld didn’t mention is this shows there are two quite different definitions of democracy. Charles Blow wrote an opinion piece for the New York Times and Dartagnan of Kos discussed it. Dartagnan summarized it as advice for Democrats:

Forget about any ideals of compromise with the Republican Party. It has become utterly irredeemable, a wholly un-American juggernaut with one goal in mind: to suppress and eliminate the voice of the American people in running the government that controls their lives. ... As long as Trump and his ilk continue to be the model and template for Republicans and party leadership, and as long as Republicans continue to kneel and pledge their fealty to his disgrace, there can be no cooperation, no compromise with them, ever. On anything. That may be a hard pill to swallow for some, but it’s the truth all Democrats need to live by, for now, and for the foreseeable future.

Mark Sumner of Kos looked at a few countries with high vaccination rates. Some, like America, have seen a dramatic drop in COVID cases, down to a case rate of 248 per 100K. In others, like Uruguay, the virus is still raging. It has a case rate of 4000 per 100K. The difference is that Uruguay has been using Sinovac, made by China. This vaccine does not do well against variants of the virus, especially the delta variant, which is much more transmissible and much more deadly. Uruguay used it because China made its version widely available at little cost. The US vaccine production has been locked up by wealthy countries and costs more. So Uruguay didn’t have much choice. It’s great that the US and other G7 countries have made a billion doses available. Alas, that’s 4 billion short of what’s needed. I like the early afternoon program on CBC Music. That stands for Canadian Broadcast Corporation (hearing this is an advantage of living in Detroit, so close to Windsor). The host, Tom Allen, has a much more interesting and humorous take on classical music than the hosts on the classical station in Detroit. So I hear the five minute hourly news a couple times each weekday. Over the last couple days the news has been about finding another field of hundreds of unmarked graves on a residential school property. One was found just a few weeks ago. These residential schools were where First Nation (their word for native) children were sent to have their culture drummed out of them, to make them think and act more white. That’s as horrific as it sounds. Leah McElrath, who advocates for human rights around the world, linked to a column about the current find in the National Post. Then she added:

I keep thinking, “There are no words.” But there are: Child abuse. Ethnic cleansing. Genocide. Among others, like heartbreaking.

Then McElrath quoted Mumilaaq Qaqqaq, a member of Parliament from Nunavut, showing a map of these residential schools. I count about 100 of them. Qaqqaq wrote:

This is a map of every residential "school" site in Canada. Every dot is a crime scene. Only a few have been investigated so far. Canada, do not get used to these numbers. Do not let them become statistics. Put yourselves in the shoes of these children in the ground.

Qaqqaq added that the map is incomplete. It doesn’t show schools in Newfoundland & Labrador because that was not part of Canada at the time the schools were started. The map also doesn’t show day schools. Canada is coming to understand what they did. Similar schools were set up in the US. We’re ignoring what we did.

Felt genuinely victimized by the prospect of equality

In honor of Indigenous People’s Day (yesterday) Melissa Higgins of Daily Kos gathered together several lists of music, movies, and books by and about indigenous people. A cartoon appropriate during Supreme Court confirmation hearings. In hearings today Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett was asked about same-sex marriage. As part of her evasive answer Barrett said:

I have never discriminated on the basis of sexual preference and would never discriminate on the basis of sexual preference.

Kerry Eleveld of Kos explained why that’s a bad, and revealing, answer.

From a social standpoint, only someone stuck in the mindset of last-century anti-LGBTQ dogma would embrace use of the term “preference.” Gay individuals don't wake up one day and decide they prefer dating people of the same sex like they prefer chocolate chip cookies to oatmeal raisin. Did Barrett wake up one morning and decide dating men was a choice for her? No. But the notion that anyone chooses to be gay or date people of the same sex is not only antiquated, it's the also the baseline that anti-LGBTQ activists have used for decades to advance and defend laws expressly discriminating against gay, lesbian, and transgender Americans. … If you believe sexual orientation is a preference, why grant same-sex marital rights to people who could choose otherwise?

In addition, while Barrett’s children attended Trinity School, a private school in South Bend, IN, she was on the board of the school and actively enforced the school’s policy to not accept children from unmarried or same-sex couples. Though she didn’t directly answer the question, she did tell us her views. And lied while doing so. Dartagnan of the Kos community discussed an article by Eric Levitz of the New York Magazine. The central question, as Dartagnan put it, is why would Moscow Mitch and his GOP colleagues

believe they can effectively abandon millions of Americans to homelessness, hunger, and unemployment, even consigning American businesses to bankruptcy, by stonewalling further efforts by Democrats to provide COVID-19 relief funding.

Part of the answer is that a majority of the GOP senators are not up for reelection this year and they would vote against a “blue state bailout.” If Mitch brought it to the floor they would question his leadership. A more important part of the answer is even if Mitch loses his majority now the chances are very good he’ll get it back soon – as in two years. Part of this is 30% of the population votes for 70% of the senators – all those low population red states. And another part is the GOP has said in the past that when they’re not in power they will prevent the Democrats from being able to govern. That’s a reason why Amy Coney Barrett is being rushed to the Supreme Court. The GOP will litigate every progressive law passed under Biden’s leadership. Nothing will get done. The GOP will campaign on the inability of the Dems to do anything and voters will put them back in power. Georgia Logothetis, in her pundit roundup for Kos, quoted Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times discussing Democratic calls for reform of the Supreme Court. Here’s part of it, which my friend and debate partner would appreciate:

Say this for Republicans: They are very good at umbrage. It might even be sincere; from Reconstruction to the New Deal to the civil rights revolution, conservatives have long felt genuinely victimized by the prospect of equality. That doesn’t mean, however, that bad-faith right-wing arguments about the courts merit a respectful hearing.

Sarah Kendzior and Andrea Chalupa of Gaslit Nation had Timothy Snyder on their show (one that I haven’t looked at yet). So when Kendzior’s twitter feed had an interesting tweet from Snyder I read it, then looked at his feed. Here are five worth quoting. One, including a video of part of the nasty guy’s balcony speech.

Mr. Trump's posture of the strong man who survived because of his strength only works if the rest of us are weaker and die.

Two, referring to the nasty guy’s tax returns.

Let us not destroy our democracy so that a lying, cheating failure can avoid the consequences of lying, cheating, and failing. It looks like the presidency is Mr. Trump‘s one hope of avoiding poverty, prison, or both. This is why, from his perspective, he must win.

Three, related to two.

The Trump campaign is tainted by legal and financial desperation. Mr. Trump is not only desperate because he's down in the polls. He's desperate because he's in a typical authoritarian situation – fearing jail or the poorhouse if he loses.

Four, quoting Zack Beauchamp of Vox:

In short, there is a consensus among comparative politics scholars that the Republican Party is one of the most anti-democratic political parties in the developed world.

Five, a quote from his own book On Tyranny.

It’s important not to talk about this as just an election. It’s an election surrounded by the authoritarian language of a coup d’etat. The opposition has to win the election and it has to win the aftermath of the election.

I read that article on Vox by Zack Beauchamp. In 2019 nearly 2,000 experts in comparative democracy were asked to rate political parties of democracies on two metrics, their commitment to democratic principles and commitment to the rights of ethnic minorities. The higher the number the more anti-democratic and intolerant the party is. The USA GOP is in the upper left of the chart, high in both measures. Its neighbors in the chart are Turkey’s AKP, a leading jailer of journalists, and Poland’s PiS, which has threatened dissenting judges with criminal punishment. The USA Dems are towards the lower left, near the median on democratic principles and well below the median (which is the good side) on minority rights. Wrote Beauchamp:

There is no authoritarian plot behind the GOP’s recent maneuvers, and no secret plan to end elections or declare martial law. What there is, instead, is systematic disinterest in behaving according to the democratic rules of the game. The GOP views the Democrats as so illegitimate and dangerous that they are willing to employ virtually any tactic that they can think of in order to entrench their own advantage. This is perhaps the party’s core animating ideology, at every level: we must win because the Democrats cannot be given power.

I shouldn’t leave off the hope, little bit about how to get the GOP out of this situation. Beauchamp wrote:

Any effort to fix American politics needs to be clear-eyed on this point: The Republican Party is so beyond what’s normal in a healthy democracy that some kind of radical pro-democracy reform is required — be it ending the filibuster, court-packing, DC and Puerto Rico statehood, a new Voting Rights Act, or all of above — to try and turn things around. “The Republicans pose too much of an authoritarian threat,” Harvard’s Levitsky tells me, “to simply go on with business as usual.”