Posts from — June 2018

A nice piece of MSM criticism: Historical New York Times Tweets.

Even the Australian media has noticed that Trump lies about immigrants.

Trump attacks Harley-Davidson for making a logical business decision in response to Trump’s idiotic tariffs.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders was upset because the owner of The Red Hen judged her on the content of her character rather than the color of her skin [with my apologies to MLK’s “Dream”]. She had to reap what she sows in every press briefing.

Update: They’re giving Sarah Huckabee Sanders Secret Service Protection. This is an outrageous waste of tax dollars.

The Defense Department annouced Two military bases to house migrants.

Fort Bliss is a huge Army installation that straddles the Texas-New Mexico border near El Paso. Lots of space and lots of people near a city on the US-Mexican border. A very logical choice.

Goodfellow AFB near San Angelo, Texas is not that big, nor is San Angelo, and having civilians on the base bothers me. I was stationed there and know what goes on. Nothing on the base involves weapons, but people without clearances on base is a problem.

The thing is putting these facilities on military bases severely restricts access and eliminates oversight by state child welfare agencies. If access to current facilities is limited, it is nothing like the restrictions on these facilities. It is safe to assume that this is intentional.

A woman from France visiting her mom in B.C. says U.S. Border Patrol held her for crossing into Blaine, Washington. A French citizen visiting her mother in British Columbia, Canada was detained by the US Border Patrol for illegally entering the US as she jogged on a beach. There are no barriers or signs indicating there is a border of any kind on the beach, but the woman was held for two weeks in a detention facility in Tacoma, Washington while her mother got clearance from Canadian officials to accept the “illegal alien” back into Canada.

They spotted her on CCTV. Why don’t they have a speaker on the camera to warn people about crossing the border instead of wasting time and money sending the Border Patrol out to pick her up and detain her.

The US-Canadian border is about 5,500 miles long with a minimum of man-made or natural barriers to indicate there is a border. The Haskell Free Library and Opera House was required to add a painted line cutting through the building to accommodate US paranoia/xenophobia.

For the majority of the 2,000 mile southern border there are natural barriers that indicate you are crossing a border.

From the BBC: Melania wears ‘I don’t really care do u?’ coat on migrant visit. That is what it says on the back of her jacket. This is an actual coat that is for sale, not sabotage by someone with white shoe polish at her border visit.

I am not going to say anything about Eva Braun visiting a Kinderinterniertenlager [child interment camp or kinlag] 👿

I will note the increasing use of “proffer” and “feckless”, which are certainly relevant to the Trump maladministration, as are malfeasance, misfeasance, and nonfeasance.

Today at 5:07AM [CDT] is the Summer Solstice, technically considered the “first day of Summer”, but the mid Summer by much of Europe.

Many Wiccans celebrate the day as Litha, while computer programmers honor their predecessors, the druids, who built the first solid-state computing devices, the megaliths, like Stonehenge.

The Slavs celebrate St. John’s Night, Иван Купала [Ivan Kupala], the battle between the White god [Белобог – Belobog] and the Black god [Чёрнобог – Chyornobog] for control of the Sun. The Black god always wins and the night begins to expand.

The sound track to the battle is Иванова Ночь на Лысой Горе [Night on Bald Mountain ] by Модест Петрович Мусоргский [Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky], which everyone should play very loudly.

Trump has bought some time and reduced the pressure on the White House with his latest Executive Order. He has not altered the policy of wasting time and money on arresting everyone who is considered an illegal border crosser, only the method of holding them, i.e. families will now be held as a unit, instead of being separated.

It doesn’t appear that the thousands of children that have already been separated will be returned to their parents, nor is it clear that the government can do that even if they want to as there is no system in place designed to facilitate that. It might require DNA testing to pair children with their parents, and those resources aren’t currently available.

It seems that the aversion DHS Secretary Neilsen has to the word “policy” is because her agency is being sued by a woman who wants her child returned. Homeland Security has apparently already denied the existence of any “policy” in its court filings.

A “Space Force”? Really? Why isn’t the US Air Force Space Command sufficient? Is he aware it exists?

Until he funds a replacement for the space shuttle there is no reason to start designing new uniforms. AFSC has been around for more than 3 decades. There are treaties that we have signed that prohibit militarizing space, not that treaties or laws will slow down the Schmuck-in-Chief.

The latest polls show two-thirds of US voters don’t like separating children from their parents. If you can’t convince your own wife, or Laura Bush, or all of the members of your own party in Congress that your policy is a good idea during an election year, maybe you’re wrong.

This will cost Republicans one or both houses of Congress, but that doesn’t make up for the pain of and trauma of the parents and children.

Update: “Since yesterday, all four living First Ladies: Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton, Laura Bush, and Rosalynn Carter have condemned this policy.”

“Oh, what a tangled web we weave
When first we practise to deceive!” – Sir Walter Scott, Marmion

To justify their evil policy of separating immigrant children from their families, Attorney General Jefferson Beauregard Sessions cites Romans 13 in the New Testament. This is the autocrats/dictators favorite verse that has been used to justify what George III was doing the the American colonies, to support slavery, to support the Jim Crow laws, to support the Nazi policies, and to justify the brutal attacks on civil rights protestors.

William Shakespeare noted in the The Merchant of Venice that:

“The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.
An evil soul producing holy witness
Is like a villain with a smiling cheek,
A goodly apple rotten at the heart.
O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!”

This in a reference to Matthew 4:1-11, in which Satan quotes Psalm 91:12 to tempt Jesus to be disobedient to G*d. I won’t claim that Jefferson Beauregard Sessions is on a level with Lucifer, for surely he is no more than a minor imp seeking to gain the approval of his master.

Speaking of whom, Trump is again poking the Chinese dragon with tariffs, and the Chinese media have responded with “wise men build bridges but fools build walls”.. Not bad snark for for a Communist propaganda outlet.

Finally, Trump is having a bit of a problem finding “the best people” for his administration: The White House Advertises at a job fair. It would appear that “everybody” does not want to work at the White House.

According to the James Joyce Center

Bloomsday is a celebration that takes place both in Dublin and around the world. It celebrates Thursday 16 June 1904, which is the day depicted in James Joyce’s novel Ulysses. The day is named after Leopold Bloom, the central character in Ulysses. The novel follows the life and thoughts of Leopold Bloom and a host of other characters – real and fictional – from 8am on 16 June 1904 through to the early hours of the following morning.

Why not?

John, by the grace of God, king of England, lord of Ireland, duke of Normandy and Aquitaine, and count of Anjou in the meadow which is called Runnymede, between Windsor and Staines, on the fifteenth day of June, 1215, signed the Great Charter in the presence of assorted heavily armed peers of the realm, who assured him it was the right thing to do.

The British Library has pictures of the Magna Carta available, but they are now requiring registration. Wikipedia has a nice discussion of the document.

The Magna Carta of 1297 is permanently residing in the US National Archives.

The Avalon Project has a translation of the 1215 version with an index and definitions.

John abided by the charter for several months, before he returned to business as normal, but the principle was established – no one is above the law.

Adopted as the flag of the United States of America by the Flag Resolution of 1777 enacted on 14 June, 1777.

The flag was first flown from Fort Stanwix, on the site of the present city of Rome, New York, on August 3, 1777. It was first under fire three days later in the Battle of Oriskany, August 6, 1777.

An official flag has a rise to run ratio of 1 to 1.9 [the flag should be 1.9 times as long as it is high] with the canton [the dark blue part] that rises over the top seven stripes with a run of 40% of the flag’s run.

The only time you will see a “correct” US Flag is if you see the official colors of a military unit. Most flags are 3’X5′ or 4’X6′ instead of 3’X5.7′ or 4’X7.6′.

Frances Bellamy, the Baptist minister and socialist who wrote the Pledge of Allegiance was from Rome, New York.

That isn’t just my opinion, it is the public statement of Fox News: Shep Smith Is Unimpressed: ‘Kim Jong-un Got It All’. Shep Smith is the anchor of the Fox News main news show.

Nicolle Wallace can’t believe the many bizarre moments at the Trump-Kim summit.

Media Matters points to the reality that Hannity has attacked Clinton’s 1994 North Korea deal for months. Experts say Trump’s deal — which Hannity loves — is even weaker.

John Amato looks at What Trump Gave Up For A Weak Deal And Photo-Op.

Trump used North Korean phrasing to described the US-South Korea joint training exercises – “provocative” “war games” and he talked about bringing the US troops home to “save money”. Actually, given that South Korea covers 50% of the cost of US troops in Korea, South Korea will save money, but the US cost for the 28,000 troops will double.

He also mentions saving the money it costs to have the B-1B bombers flying from Guam to participate in the joint exercises, but never addresses what it costs for him to fly down to Mar-a-Lago all the time… 😈

For younger people, Rod Serling was the host, writer, creator of an early television anthology show called The Twilight Zone. The common thread for the individual episodes was that nothing was what you assumed it was.

The recent actions of Trumplethinskin™ trying to get the other members of the G7 to readmit Russia really does not fit the reality that his own Treasury Department was getting ready to hit five Russian firms with sanctions, citing cyberattacks.

Then he attacks Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada, for disagreeing with the tariffs that Trump decided to impose on the other members of the G7. The NDP opposition party in the Canadian parliament introduced a motion and MPs united to condemn Trump’s tariffs and verbal attacks.

Of course the real reason that Trump flipped was the picture released by the German government showing Angela Merkel possibly telling Trump that he would only be permitted spoons and siipy cups at future G7 meetings, and the spoons would be rubber coated. He had to attack Trudeau, because he’s afraid of Merkel.

Krugman attacks the Media for placating the GOP with ‘Both Siderism’: Republicans ‘are just completely insane’.

“Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.” – attributed to Daniel Patrick Moynihan

A fact is the US runs a trade surplus with Canada and they are one of our biggest clients. Further, the question of the Canadian protection of their dairy industry was dealt with in the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement that Trump refused to consider because “Obama”.

Having demonstrated once again that he is Putin’s Полезный идиот [useful idiot] with his repeated attempts to sponsor Russia returning to the G7 Group, his sycophants went the 1930’s German route.

Having already endorsed the use of Verschärfte Vernehmung [enhanced interrogations] the ‘Hair Furor’ had to be pleased that both of his so-called trade advisors, Peter Navvaro & Larry Kudlow, decided it was time to haul out the Dolchstoßlegende [the back-stabbing myth] for the ‘fine people’ who marched in Charlottesville.

Instead of referring to the dregs of humanity left in the White House as sycophants, I think it would be more accurate to call them ‘remora’ because:

“Although it was initially believed that remoras fed off particulate matter from the host’s meals, this has been shown a falsehood, in reality their diets are primarily composed of host feces instead.”