Category Archives: Blogs' Archive

The link is to a video you should watch.  Sure, it’s just Dianne Feinstein being her arrogant, dismissive self, but the thing is Dianne Feinstein is really old, and perhaps not as glib and quick witted as she used to be.  So, her ‘I don’t give a shit what you think’ attitude is not as cleverly disguised, and comes shining through like a beacon.
A bunch of school kids came to her office, with a lovely printed up statement, asking her very nicely if she good get behind the Green New Deal because they’re only kids, and they’d like to grow up to be adults and not choke to death on the air.
DiFi’s response, as I just said, was pretty shocking even for her.  Basically, she said “You’re just a bunch of kids and you’re not old enough to vote and I’ve been in congress since before your parents were old enough to have sex, so I know what I’m doing and you all can just piss off.”  Those aren’t the exact words, but they’re a lot closer than you might think.

The line that really threw me was when the kids rebutted her and said “But the U.N. report said we have to turn the situation around in 10 years or it will be environmentally catastrophic.”  Well, again those aren’t the exact words, and the U.N. report said 12 years, not 10, but their basic point was right on.  Feinstein said “It’s not going to be turned around in 10 years.”

It could be.  We know how to build solar panels, we know how to build windmills, and countries from China to Germany are building them like crazy.  The world could put up enough solar panels and windmills to convert all current power plants to clean energy in no more than a year or two, and after that the money (i.e. the cheap and plentiful energy to power a civilization) would just come rolling in.  We know how to plant trees, and there’s pretty much no limit to the number.  China and India have both done events where they planted hundreds of thousands of trees in a day.  We know how to recycle garbage, with far greater efficiency than we currently do.

We could do it in 10 years, especially if we start right away.  And one of the first steps is to get rid of nasty old bats like Dianne Feinstein.

One of the classic arguments for electing female candidates is that that will make the world a kinder, gentler place, but you sure as hell would never guess that from watching the flamboyantly ignorant Meghan McCain and the gang of Merry Warmongers on The View.  I don’t even get what that show is all about – a collection of female minor celebrities, sharing their ill informed opinions – I guess it is sort of the TV version of the Huffington Post.
Anyway, it was claws out the other day when they hosted the perfectly amiable congresswoman from Hawaii, Tulsi Gabbard.  They are all in favor of more conflict in Syria, plus invading Venezuela.  Here’s the point I want to make:  while Venezuela is at least a current issue, the Syria invasion took place a while back. (Trump was not even in office yet.  That one is on Obama.)  But, Tulsi Gabbard was against it.  She pointed out that Syria is, whatever you think of their internal politics, no threat to the U.S.  Which is true.  There are no Syrian submarines lying in wait  just outside of New York’s harbor, there are no Syrian tank battalions revving their engines on the Mexican border, and not one American city has been bombed by the Syrian Air Force, like, ever.  She also pointed out that attempts at regime change invariably hurt the civilian populations of those countries, and don’t do the American citizens any good at all, unless of course you’re an executive of an oil company.  And, the main thing, the one thing that nobody should ever forget and the point of tonight’s blog, is SHE WAS RIGHT.  U.S. intervention in Syria has been a big mistake.  It has cost money, it has cost lives, and it has not accomplished anything at all.
And yet, somehow they want Tulsi to be the bad guy, because she opposed it.  That, my friends, is some seriously ass-backwards logic.

You know those surveys where you answer a bunch of questions about how you feel on different political issues and they tell you who you should vote for?  Yeah, well I don’t pay too much attention to them, either, but just for the raw hell of it, because I have a blog and I can, I’ve created my own little handy-dandy guide for how everybody should vote in the Democratic primaries.  Here goes:

1. If you love Bernie Sanders without reservations, you should vote for Bernie Sanders.

2. If you like Bernie’s positions, but think he’s too old, you should vote for Tulsi Gabbard.

3. If you like Bernie’s positions, but think “eh, I don’t know, he sounds so cranky and he’s always waving his finger,” you should vote for Tulsi Gabbard.

4. If you love Tulsi Gabbard, you should vote for Tulsi Gabbard.

5.  If you love Tulsi Gabbard, but think she’s too young and inexperienced, you should vote for Bernie Sanders.

6.  If you support Kamala Harris, despite her monstrous record as California AG, the fact that her largest campaign contributors are TimeWarner and Steve Mnuchin, and her own father disapproves of her campaign, just because ‘she is a strong woman of color,’ you should vote for Tulsi Gabbard.

7. If you support Elizabeth Warren because you like her economic agenda, you should vote for Bernie.  Same agenda, but Bernie didn’t stand up to clap when Trump promised to crush it.

8. If you support Amy Klobuchar or Kirsten Gillibrand because it’s high time we had a woman president (and, really, there is no other reason) then you should vote for Tulsi Gabbard.

9.  If you support Andrew Yang, because you think UBI is absolutely the most pressing issue in the world, I think you may actually be ahead of your time.  Try voting for somebody that supports a $15 an hour minimum wage and has a realistic chance at winning this year (e.g. Tulsi or Bernie), and then write them a nice letter suggesting they appoint Yang as secretary of the treasury, or commerce.

10.  If you support Joe Biden because you like garrulous, old, white haired men who’ve been in politics forever, you should vote for Bernie.

11.  If  you support Beto O’Rourke because you think it’s so  cool the way he rides a skateboard, you should vote for Tulsi.  She SURFS.

12.  If you support Corey Booker, I really don’t know what the hell is wrong with you.

I’ve got mixed feelings about Bernie’s announcement.  Of course, he’s great, and I was a Bernie supporter before I was a Tulsi supporter.  But, I’m afraid it’s bad strategy.  Admittedly, I was hoping he’d stay out and throw his support to Tulsi, which I think would have made her unbeatable.  But also, I think it’s bad strategy.  If the DNC manages to cheat again, and you can be darned sure they are going to try, then we will have nobody left on the outside to mount a credible 3rd party run.

Damn, though, I’d forgotten a bit about what a powerful speaker he is.  That announcement speech was hot stuff.  It was a shot across the bow of the bourgeosie, it was a throwing down of the gauntlet, it was a declaration of class war.  In short, it was fucking awesome.
The part about 1 million volunteers was kind of a bold gamble, or would have been except, I suspect, he already has them.  Depends on how you count, a bit, I suppose.  If you just mean people who follow him on twitter and Facebook, it’s a soft number.  If it’s people who are willing to go door to door for him, well, he might have that to.  He raised over a million bucks in small donations within a couple hours of his speech.

On the issues, there’s not much ground between them.  Bernie is a bit more laser-focused on economic issues, Tulsi was a lot quicker on the ball when it came time to speak up against the bullshit attempted coup in Venezuela , but they are close enough that all of Tulsi’s supporters like Bernie, too, and vice versa.

So, welcome to the race, Bernie.

It might not make any difference.  Both George W. Bush and Donald Trump had relatives who condemned them very publicly, who urged people not to vote for their horrible relatives, who said “Look, we know him.  He’s a total piece of shit.  Don’t vote for him,” or words to that effect.  They got elected anyway.
But, this is still the Democratic primary, so it may shake out a bit differently.  At any rate, it’s far too juicy not to report.
A bit of background: Kamala Harris admitted, on a radio program a few days back, that she’s smoked pot a-plenty.  There was a time when I would have celebrated that statement coming from any politician, but seeing as how it comes from somebody who’s built their career on throwing other people in jail for that most harmless of all possible pastimes, I am not so sympathetic.
Part of her statement was “Hey, I’m Jamaican, of course I’ve smoked pot”  or words to that effect, which, I must admit, is part of my image of Jamaica.  I’ve only been there once, as part of a Carribean cruise, but I managed to find weed within 15 minutes of coming ashore and spent the whole day high as a parrot.

Her father, however, was not pleased.  In a written statement posted online, he said “My dear departed grandmothers… as well as my deceased parents , must be turning in their grave right now to see their family’s name, reputation and proud Jamaican identity being connected, in any way, jokingly or not with the fraudulent stereotype of a pot-smoking joy seeker and in the pursuit of identity politics. Speaking for myself and my immediate Jamaican family, we wish to categorically dissociate ourselves from this travesty.”

While I may disapprove of Kamala Harris for different reasons than her father does, I’m glad he has made this public statement.  She very much does not deserve to be president of the United States.