Category Archives: Blogs' Archive

One of the first things  I  did after discovering the exciting world of social media, about 10 or 12 years ago, was to look myself up on Google.  I do it  periodically, even though nobody’s buying my books and I’m not getting any  more famous, and I don’t know why I do it – it’s just a constant reminder that there are 3 or 4 other Willie Watson’s in the world who are far more well  known than  I am.
So, I was a bit surprised that Donald Trump, the president of the United States, who tweets all over the goddamned place, was so shocked at what he found when he looked himself up on  Google.
Was this his first time?
That’s only part of it, of course.  The thing is, I believe he was genuinely surprised and shocked that everybody was saying bad things about him.  I think he expected he’d see the rantings of his supporters and maybe a few fawning articles from Forbes 30 years ago.
With most politicians, when they start with the “Is he stupid, or truly evil” I am inclined to say “Evil, because nobody is that stupid.”  Now, I certainly believe Trump is evil.  He is as evil as they come.  But he is also, without a doubt, that stupid.  This is just the most recent proof of that.

Bernie still has the magic.  I just saw a video of him, current, introducing a band at a rock concert in Vermont.  I sort of got the feeling he was a surprise guest because the crowd absolutely went insane.  And, it was a rock concert, not a political rally.  So, the thing is, Bernie Sanders, a politician, can randomly appear in front of an American crowd (admittedly, this was a bunch of teenagers in Vermont, but I’ve seen the same reaction to Bernie other places) and get a wildly enthusiastic response from  the entire audience.  Hillary Clinton can’t do that.  Donald Trump can’t do that.
He gave his usual 5 minute speech, which was greeted with regular and enthusiastic cheers like punctuation at the end of his bullet points, introduced the band, and walked off into  the night.  It was a beautiful thing.

While I’m on the subject of Bernie, let’s talk about his bill to make corporations pay if any of their employees get food stamps.  It’s brilliant.  Not so much economically brilliant.  It will  pull in a bit of tax money, but the companies aren’t incentivized to offer a higher wage, they’ll just go ahead and pay the fine and the root problem won’t be changed.  I’m not saying it’s  a bad idea, I’d just like to  see  some punitive damages added.
Politically brilliant, though, you bet.  Nobody can argue against forcing shitweasels like Jeff Bezos, and the Waltons,  and the Disney Corporation to pay their  employees a living wage, or pay the Federal government whatever it’s going to cost to subsidize them, which comes out of taxes, which are mostly paid by working and middle class people.
Whoever votes against this bill is a shameless tool  of the oligarchy, and no  way  around it.

The great debate among Berniecrats for the last couple of days, of course, has been the Democratic Party’s ‘reforms.’  Do we go with quote marks or not?
First, of course, was that question about the superdelegates not being allowed to vote on the first ballot, which some said is great, the superdelegates won’t have a vote, and others of us saying ‘weeeelllll…’

Donna Brazile didn’t do anything to allay  our fears or bring even a semblance of unity when she said ‘We’ll still  be there and we know  how to fix the game.’  She didn’t actually  say ‘fix the game,’ but it’s what she meant.

Then there’s the two paragraph gem we were introduced to today.  The first paragraph says “I absolutely pinkie swear that I’m a Democrat and if I’m nominated I’ll still call myself a Democrat, and even if I’m elected, I won’t rip off my mask at the inauguration and say “Ha!Ha! Psyche!  I’m a Republican,” which may intimidate Claire McCaskill  out  of a run, I don’t know.
Then there was that scary 2nd paragraph, which said the Chairman of the Democratic Party (currently Tom ‘a pigeon shat on my head’ Perez) had full authority to decide who was a Democrat and who wasn’t, which is very scary except even the Democrats aren’t stupid enough to actually use that as a power play.  Then again, you never know.

The thing I was relieved to NOT find in there, and I’ll bet the DNC pressed for it and Bernie told ’em to fuck off, at least that’s the way I imagine it, was a clause saying any disappointed candidates couldn’t then leave and run as an independent.
So, my dream strategy is still in play.  Which is this: that Tulsi Gabbard run for the Democratic nomination and all Berniecrats should support her because, between those two groups, we could easily secure a first ballot win and a general election win and we’d have our first woman president and she’d be a progressive.

Meanwhile, Bernie is working to get on  the ballot in all 50 States as an  independent.  In case Tulsi does not get the nomination, he’s ready.  If she does, he backs out.  Either way, we would have a progressive candidate in the general election.  A progressive candidate who could  win.

Try to remember back to a time long ago, in the last millennium even, when George Bush was president – the first one, who was as much of an evil war monger as anybody but not quite as obvious as his retarded son – and his vice president was Dan Quayle, a man who was so stupid that people called him Bush’s impeachment insurance.
Remember that one time when he was visiting a school and he argued with a kid over how to spell potato and he was wrong because he thought it had an e at the end and everybody in America laughed and laughed about how stupid the vice-president was, as if half of them wouldn’t have spelled it with a e at the end, too, because you add the e when it’s a plural, i.e. potatoes, so there’s at  least kind of a reverse logic to it.
What could be stupider than screwing up the spelling of potato in an easy photo-op with school kids?  Screwing up on coloring the American flag in an easy photo-op with kids in a hospital.  He did use red and blue markers, at least, but he colored a couple of the stripes blue.  Now, some are saying he was trying to draw the Russian flag but he kind of screwed that up, too.
Myself, I think he was just being kind of lazy and screwing around, like ‘yeah, I’ll make some marks on the paper while the cameras roll, ‘ and didn’t care if he got it right or not.  Because nobody could be that stupid, could they?  Especially someone who is surrounded by American flags at almost all times.
Could they?

The Democratic Party has decided to limit the role of superdelegates, a little bit, and I’m not sure if it’s a win for progressives or not.
On the one hand, Bernie Sanders seems to support the move, so  maybe I should just shut up and stop bitching, but the sting of their saying they would refuse corporate donations and then just cavalierly reversing that when they thought nobody was looking still stings, and, while we would dearly love to have a Democratic party which plays fair, they haven’t given much indication that they’re ready to start moving in that direction.

So, I ‘m skeptical.  They might try to reverse this  again before 2020, or there may be so many candidates running that nobody gets a clear majority on the first ballot, and then wham-o, they come out on the second ballot and give us another corporate fuckweasel just like all the corporate fuckweasels before them, and then expect us to vote for them because they’ve provided a better show of even-handedness than ever before.

On the other hand, no matter how the election is  framed, we (and ultimately they, no matter how much money they have to spend) will have to win it by convincing most people that we are right, and we are winning that war.