Category: Dickitude

Sunday Cartoon Blogging – January 15, 2023

With all of the false equivalency about secret documents that mysteriously travel outside their protected locations, you can be forgiven for not hearing about the antics in Missouri’s state legislature. From the WaPo:

“The Republican-controlled Missouri House of Representatives used its session’s opening day Wednesday to tighten the dress code for female legislators, while leaving the men’s dress code alone.”

The state’s House-approved bill requires women’s arms to be concealed. Missouri wouldn’t force its citizens to wear masks during Covid – even with lives at risk. But Missouri is forcing women to wear long sleeves instead of going sleeveless, something that endangers no one.

Imagine if Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) was instead a member of the Missouri House. He would finally have to roll his sleeves down and put on a jacket.

Republican legislators need to become enraged to go to work — not perturbed, not irritated, not annoyed, but furious — and it’s always a made-up crisis and always someone else’s fault, most likely a Democrat’s. Take your pick: Drag queen story hour. Pedophiles in pizza parlors. Genderless potato head toys. Migrant caravans. M&M’s in a lesbian relationship. Trans takeover of sports and bathrooms. Critical Race Theory. Antifa mobs dressing up like MAGAs and attacking the Capitol. Jewish space lasers starting forest fires. Dems are coming for your gas stoves. And so, so many more. On to cartoons.

Joe’s garage finds a problem:

MAGAs want more:

Didn’t we seen this before?

And Trump’s crowds were bigger:

Santos, if that’s really your name, we have a job for you:

Spare:

It takes courage to speak about things that we’re traumatized into not speaking about. What surprises Wrongo most about this is the lack of empathy or understanding he sees by Americans toward Harry as a young boy who, as a 12 year-old had to perform as an adult at his mother’s funeral.

Now he is an adult, a husband and father. So many people in the US have scorn for him. Why does he have to dump all of this on us? Why doesn’t he simply get on with his life rather than telling this story over and over on Oprah, 60 Minutes, and in his book?

Wrongo has watched the Netflix documentary. He will not read the book. But it’s evident that Harry’s rage, and his grief, remain. He’s still trying to make sense of what happened to him after his mother died. While his Royal family may have moved on, he hasn’t.

Worse yet, he’s a male. Western society isn’t tolerant of males who show vulnerability or confusion as an adult. Worse, his own family’s expectations are to simply soldier on.

America likes big stories of family dysfunction, and we sure have a good one in the long-lived soap opera called the British Royals.

Harry deserves closure and happiness. He stood up for his wife and kids. His birth “family” treated him horribly. He’s written his book, and he may make a ton of money off it. Why should any of that make Americans angry?

 

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Saturday Soother – January 14, 2023

The Daily Escape:

A view from Shenandoah NP near Keezletown, VA – January 1, 2023 photo by One Man’s Outdoor Journey

Wrongo and Ms. Right live far enough out in the country that we have no city water, sewer, or gas lines. But the cooktop in our recently remodeled kitchen runs on propane while our ovens are electric. We have a well and septic. Our hot water is made by propane as well.

So what are we supposed to make of this week’s controversy over the Biden administration’s Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) possibly banning future sales of natural gas stoves and cooktops? The reason for this is that burning gas stoves put their partially burned fuel, including nitrogen dioxide (NO2) in the air, which causes asthma. And older stoves with pilot lights instead of electric igniters also push NO2 into the air.

On Monday, Bloomberg reported that the CPSC was considering new regulations around gas stoves, given growing concerns over indoor pollutants. Commissioner Richard Trumka Jr. said:

“Any option is on the table….Products that can’t be made safe can be banned.”

The proposal by the CPSC followed a December study by scientists finding that gas ranges that burn natural gas account for almost 13% of childhood-asthma cases in the US. Advocates have long argued against gas stoves, saying the pollution they emit makes them inferior to other options, such as electric or induction ranges. But the asthma statistic breathed new life into the debate.

OK, Wrongo knows the difference between propane and natural gas, but when he first heard about the debate, it was unclear whether his gas of choice was also a health problem and had to die.

Bloomberg neglected to say that any CPSC regulations, like other proposed state and local-level bans of gas stoves, only applies to new construction. But that didn’t keep Republicans from evoking visions of a 2023 filled with government agents busting down doors and ripping out stoves. That tentative regulation conversation about how to best mitigate the health hazards of gas stoves morphed into a Right Wing campaign to convince Real Americans that the Government is coming for their gas stoves:

Rep. Ronny Jackson, (R-TX) tweeted:

“If the maniacs in the White House come for my stove, they can pry it from my cold dead hands,”

From Sen. Tom Cotton,(R-AK):

“Democrats are coming for your kitchen appliances,”

From Rep. Byron Donalds, (R-FL):

“Get your hands off our gas stoves!!!!”

From Rep. Jim Jordan,(R-OH):

“God. Guns. Gas stoves.”

God, Guns, and Gas stoves! All because one appointee in the administration discussed it. But this controversy isn’t about facts; like always, it’s about feelings. Over 30 years ago, the Clean Energy Act was easily renewed on a bipartisan basis. Since then, the environment has become part of the culture wars.

The reflex to position gas stoves as the last redoubt of traditional American life threatened by big government, is just stereotypical of the American Right wing. It’s difficult to see the fight about gas stoves as something that will move the needle since gas is far more common in cities and blue states. So, let the Republicans keep on cooking up the outrage du jour. It’s doubtful that the voters will be eating it up.

Remember their past freak-outs, like when former Rep. Michele Bachmann tried to build a political career around preserving incandescent light bulbs? Another useless freak-out.

In retrospect, it’s honestly shocking we were able in 1975 to ban leaded gasoline in America, although there were lots of dissenters at the time. And now, since we’ve gotten all their guns, it only makes sense that Democrats go after their gas stoves.

Let’s leave these partisan debates in the kitchen where they belong and embrace our Saturday Soother, that special time when we stop thinking about Biden’s secret document stash, or why Jim Jordan dresses like a gym teacher, and spend a few minutes contemplating nearly nothing.

Start by brewing up a big mug of Wilton Benitez Orange Bourbon ($19.00/8 oz.) from Wisconsin’s JBC Coffee Roasters. Apparently the coffee cherries for this variant turn orange when they ripen rather than the typical red and tend to be even more fruity than their red counterparts. The roaster says it is super creamy with flavors of candied ginger, pineapple, and cream soda.

Now grab a seat by a south-facing window to watch and listen to “Fandango” from the Guitar Quintet in D-major, G.448 by Boccherini, performed live in 2015 at the Schubertiade in Hohenems, Austria. Boccherini was an Italian composer and cellist who died in 1805. A fandango is a Spanish dance:

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Biden’s Secret Documents Problem

The Daily Escape:

Spokane in fog, Spokane, WA – January 2023 photo by James Richman Photography

Seems like Biden has handed a present to Trump and the MAGAs by taking some classified documents with him when he left the vice presidency. Republicans pounced on Biden’s gift. Others on the left are working hard to underscore how this situation is different from the investigation into Trump’s handling of classified information after he left office. CNN breaks down the differences for us:

It’s true that there are differences. When the documents were discovered in November by Biden’s attorneys in files at his former offices at Penn Biden, they were turned over the next day to the National Archives (NARA), the responsible party. NARA then made a referral to the FBI, and Merrick Garland asked a Trump-appointed prosecutor, John R. Lausch, one of the two remaining Trump US Attorney appointees to investigate the breach.

Biden’s was the textbook method that’s followed when misplaced classified documents are found. Are you surprised that Biden kept two Trump-appointed US Attorneys? Wrongo was.

In Biden’s case, there wasn’t an earlier request from NARA that was ignored, and no search warrant was required. No lawyers erroneously or dishonestly vouched that Biden was not in possession of classified documents, and there was no effort to obstruct justice.

But the question of how these documents found their way to Biden’s private office once he became a private citizen needs to be investigated. Among the purposes for getting to the bottom of this is that our laws require that classified documents must be under continuous control.

Back in the day when Wrongo had a TS clearance, someone who took a secret document from its filing place signed for it. And if/when a document changed hands, you got a receipt from the next person to prove they had it and not you. And heaven help you if you lost the receipt.

It should be a simple task to follow the chain of custody on the ten documents that were found in Biden’s old office, back to who signed them out. We may learn that it was one of his staffers who took them during the transition period before Biden was inaugurated.

This could become a serious issue if someone was found to have intentionally taken documents with them when they left the White House. Whoever took the documents should be accountable for this mistake, just as Trump should be accountable for mishandling the classified information he brought to Mar-a-Lago.

There’s no reason to excuse Biden for this. Apparently, we need a much better system for controlling classified documents when one administration transitions to another. What’s similar in both cases is that classified information was packed up along with personal items. In Biden’s case, that included documents related to his son Beau Biden’s funeral.

To Democrats, Biden’s slip up may be understandable. And if Trump had apologized for his sloppiness, and most important, cooperated in solving the problem, maybe he wouldn’t be in the trouble he’s in today.

However things shake out legally for Biden or Trump, neither Party should want our nation’s secrets to be insecure. That means we need a new process for inventorying and returning classified materials when they are signed out. But no process will work correctly when the outgoing president refuses to concede the election and instead attempts to launch a coup.

Politically, this looks like it could become a political nightmare, both for Biden and for AG Merrick Garland. Will it damage the document theft case that the DOJ has against Trump? That’s the easiest case for the DOJ to prosecute and win vs. Trump.

We can count on the Republican-controlled House to try to make the Biden document slip up the equivalent to Trump’s legal bind. OTOH, a Republican committee going after Biden on classified documents requires them to acknowledge that what Trump did was wrong, which they have refused to do.

This sets us up for 24 months of political theater. It will look similar to the 2015 Hillary Clinton Benghazi hearings held by many Republican-led House committees. Back then, there were eight Congressional investigations into the Benghazi attacks. The House Select Committee alone spent over 17 months investigating. That was longer than the Watergate hearings.

Listening to these bad faith trolls for the next two years will be exhausting. We know that the various committees that will investigate this are really designed to generate GOP propaganda. They will put the DOJ in a position where they will have to resist giving the committee answers. And on Fox this’ll become screams of “cover up”.

If there is criminal wrong-doing on Biden’s part, you can bet that the Trump-appointed DOJ attorney Lausch will find it. If Lausch doesn’t find any criminal wrong-doing, then we can be fairly sure none took place.

Buckle up.

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Griner Comes Home

The Daily Escape:

Barn before a storm, Walla Walla, WA – 2022 photo by Gary Hamburgh Photography

After 10 months in Russian custody, including time in a penal colony, WNBA star Brittney Griner is on her way home. In exchange for Griner’s freedom, Russia secured the release of Viktor Bout, a convicted Russian arms smuggler. Another American, the former Marine Paul Whelan, remains imprisoned in Russia.

CNN reports that the White House said Griner was released to US officials. From Biden:

“Moments ago I spoke to Brittney Griner…She is safe. She is on a plane. She is on her way home.”

The prisoner swap occurred in Abu Dhabi on Thursday. A joint statement from the UAE and Saudi Arabia said both Gulf countries played a role mediating the exchange between the US and Russia. By the time you are reading this, Griner should be on American soil.

But the result is a mixed bag. It’s very good news that Griner is free. But Viktor Bout is also free to rebuild his arms-dealing network. People are rightly wondering why Whelan wasn’t included in the trade. After all, he’s finishing his fifth year in Russian prison. But negotiation requires both sides to agree and the Russians would only offer Griner.

Of course, the Right-wing chattering class disapproved. First, from House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy, who tweeted:

“This is a gift to Vladimir Putin, and it endangers American lives….Leaving Paul Whelan behind for this is unconscionable.”

Some Conservative mouth-breather named Jessie Kelly tweeted this:

“She’s a black lesbian who hates America. Biden is just bringing another voter back home.”

Another mouth-breather, Conservative Benny Johnson who has a show on Newsmax, tweeted this with typical Right-wing understatement:

“This is the lowest point in US foreign policy in my lifetime. Collapse of an empire.”

It can’t be a long life for young Benny. What is he, five years old?

You have to love the comments by these wingnuts each of whom say they could have brokered a better deal with their expert negotiating skills. And rather than be happy that one American is returning home, they use their oral flatulence to make comments about what should have happened, and why Biden is a loser.

Poor Paul Whelan’s family shows that most Americans still have decency and class:

“NEW from the Whelan family: “There is no greater success than for a wrongful detainee to be freed & for them to go home. The Biden Admin made the right decision to bring Ms. Griner home, & to make the deal that was possible, rather than waiting for one that wasn’t going to…”

The American people should thank Paul Whelan’s brother David for being so gracious. That isn’t something that we can say about the many Republican mouthpieces who felt it was necessary to weigh in.

People need to stop thinking about this as a trade or a prisoner exchange. The Russians kidnapped Griner and held her for ransom. She was a wonderful target, being a very tall black lesbian woman playing professional basketball in Russia. She was chosen, then convicted, and then sent to the gulag for the very purpose of being bait to spring Viktor Bout.

Does it suck that the price of releasing her was letting an odious killer go free? Of course. It shouldn’t be lost on anyone that as individuals and given their relative “crimes”, they weren’t equivalent assets. Everyone knows that Griner’s offense was simply a pretext to create a prisoner that could be traded. The initial arrest was about finding a small amount of hash oil on a Black gay woman.

Prisoner exchanges usually look like, “You arrested one of our spies and we want him back, so we arrested one of your spies. Let’s talk.” They don’t normally look like: “We plucked a random minor celebrity of yours off the street and she’s gonna do nine years.”

And when they do, it’s important to point out that it’s more like a kidnapping and a ransom than it is like an equivalent exchange.

Two closing thoughts. First, Conservatives always say: “Don’t negotiate with terrorists“. But all nations negotiate with terrorists; that’s just something governments say. Negotiating with terrorists doesn’t incentivize terrorism. It incentivizes terrorists to negotiate. The alternative is that terrorists engage in terrorism that does not involve negotiations. And that only leads to terrible outcomes.

All governments have to decide whether to negotiate or not on a case by case basis.

Second, Americans, especially conspicuous Americans, should stay the hell out of Russia until the Putin government’s current business plan is updated.

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Sunday Cartoon Blogging – December 4, 2022

Well, the US is out of the round of sixteen at the World Cup. Wrongo didn’t watch. It’s maybe arbitrary on his part, but he really has quite a bit of antipathy about the Gulf countries. Those countries have oil, without which they would simply be backwater places with doctrinaire religions and impossible politics.

Another thing: Last week, Edward Snowden swore an oath of allegiance to Russia and has received a Russian passport, his lawyer said Friday. The 39-year-old former intelligence contractor was granted Russian citizenship by Vladimir Putin in September. He faces espionage charges and 30 years in prison in the United States if he were to return, but he no longer faces extradition to the US. On to cartoons.

When will Trump get his just desserts?

Why was it necessary for Dems to portray the possible railroad strike as a problem caused only by labor?

With all we hear about Elon, Trump, and Bezos, why are they still glorified?

Republican Rep. Kevin McCarthy is having some trouble becoming the next House Speaker:

Which is worse?

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Thursday Before The Midterms

The Daily Escape:

Candlewood Lake, New Milford, CT – October 2022 photo by Julia Turk

Thoughts on the Thursday before the midterms:

  • Wrongo is hoping to give thanks for whatever November brings, but he’s increasingly concerned about the midterms.
  • Memes about hammers are making the rounds. Let’s start with whether Paul Pelosi’s attacker was a good or a bad guy with a hammer. Wrongo guesses that depends on your political viewpoint. Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY) retweeted this photo that mocks Paul Pelosi for having his head bashed in with a hammer by a MAGA radical:

Tenney won her seat in 2020 by around 100 votes. She took office a month after Jan. 6, so she didn’t vote on certifying the election results. She has now vacated her redistricted seat in the 22nd district to run in the neighboring 24th instead.

She is what Republicans have become. It’s true that victims of political violence can be found among both US political Parties, but as David Frum says in The Atlantic:

“…if both Republicans and Democrats, left and right, suffer political violence, the same cannot be said of those who celebrate political violence. That’s not a “both sides” affair in 2020s America.”

You don’t see Democratic candidates carrying assault rifles in their campaign ads. Republican candidates, on the other hand, are now more likely to pose with AR-15s than they are with their wives and kids. More from Frum:

“You don’t see Democratic House members wielding weapons in videos and threatening to shoot candidates who want to cut capital-gains taxes or slow the growth of Medicare. Democratic candidates for Senate do not post video fantasies of hunting and executing political rivals, or of using a firearm to discipline their children’s romantic partners. It’s not because of the Democratic members that Speaker Nancy Pelosi installed metal detectors to bar firearms from the floor of the House…”

Max Boot in the WaPo:

“The New America think tank found last year that, since Sept. 11, 2001, far-right terrorists had killed 122 people in the US, compared with only one killed by far-leftists. A study from the Center for Strategic and International Studies last year found that, since 2015, right-wing extremists had been involved in 267 plots or attacks, compared with 66 for left-wing extremists. A Washington Post-University of Maryland survey released in January found that 40% of Republicans said violence against the government can be justified, compared with only 23% of Democrats.”

Political violence in America is driven primarily by the far Right, not the far Left. And the far Right is now the mainstream of the Republican Party. It’s hard to see how this ends well. Maybe we should be calling them the Wrong Wing. You can’t call them the Right Wing because they are completely wrong on every issue.

With so few days to go until the midterms, Wrongo has closed his wallet for all candidates. On our local TV stations, the same ads run constantly, and seem to have little impact. Few of them are any good anyway. Most repeat some version of their national Party line.

It may be too little too late, but the esteemed Rachel Bitecofer who we’ve featured often, was participating on a podcast hosted by Jill Wine-Banks. Wine-Banks asked about better messaging for Democrats. And without hesitation, Bitecofer said:

“If Republicans win, you lose . . . .”

Doesn’t that ring true? “If Republicans win, you lose.” If that had been the Democrats’ slogan for the midterms, it would have led to some great talking points:

  • Who do you want in Congress — someone who doesn’t want to extend the child tax credit or someone who does?
  • Someone who doesn’t want to provide paid family and medical leave, or someone who does?
  • Someone who doesn’t want to protect Social Security and Medicare, or someone who does?
  • Someone who doesn’t want a $15 hourly minimum wage, or someone who does?
  • Someone who doesn’t want to deliver affordable, quality childcare, or someone who does?
  • Someone who’s against healthcare for all, or someone who’s for it?

“If Republicans win, you lose” has been true in every election since 1932. So, it’s better late than never to use it as a messaging tool.

We haven’t posted cartoons in a while. Here are a couple to get you in the mood for voting:

Voting is like driving: If you want to go backwards, you select R. To go forward, you select D.

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Monday Wake Up Call – October 31, 2022

The Daily Escape:

Monument Valley rainstorm – October, 2022 photo by Martine Hubscher

Wrongo and Ms. Right are heading home to the land of disputed elections after a very fine week in London. We hadn’t been to England since 2019, and it was at least a little sad to learn that some of the local places near our hotel had succumbed to the pandemic. On the bright side, our favorite Indian place was open and thriving.

We can’t start Monday without acknowledging the death of Jerry Lee Lewis. He was the last one standing of the founding generation of rock ‘n rollers. Wrongo knows all of you are saying “But, what about Elvis”?

Early Elvis changed the world, but he died young and was already long past his peak when he did. Bill Haley, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, and Buddy Holly all exited before the Killer. None had his longevity. And that along with his talent is why he’s a greater artist than almost anyone of that generation of the major early rock stars. Some might quibble and say what about Sam Cooke? Or Dion?

As for Jerry Lee’s personal life, you know the story and it wasn’t good. He may be the ultimate example of differentiating between the art and the artist.

One wonderful and overlooked part of the Killer’s early career was an impromptu jam session involving Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and Johnny Cash made on December 4, 1956, at the Sun Record Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. An article about the session was published in the Memphis Press-Scimitar under the title “Million Dollar Quartet”.

A recording of the session was released in Europe in 1981 as The Million Dollar Quartet with 17 tracks. Subsequently, it inspired a musical called the “Million Dollar Quartet” that played on Broadway and in the West End. Both are closed now, but it does occasionally travel in the US. Wrongo loved it when he saw it. See it if you can.

Regarding the hammering attack on Paul Pelosi by a Right Wing MAGA fellow traveler, it should be seen as an assassination attempt on the highest ranking Democrat in Congress and the woman who is second in line of succession to the presidency.

CNN is reporting that the man who attacked Pelosi had with him a bag that contained multiple zip ties.

This is all part of a pattern. First there was the assassination plot against the Governor of Michigan. Then there was a violent insurrection on Jan. 6, the attempted coup. These were followed by assassination threats/plots against multiple Democratic members of Congress and the members of the Jan. 6 Committee.

Now, on the verge of a very important midterm election, the Speaker of the House’s husband is beaten. From Brian Kass an Atlantic contributor and an associate professor at University College London:

“This week, 3 men were convicted of trying to kidnap Gov. Whitmer, a man pleaded guilty to threatening Rep. Eric Swalwell, a right wing conspiracy theorist tried to murder Speaker Pelosi, shortly after Bannon, who called to behead Fauci, was sentenced to prison. This isn’t random.”

More:

“There are dangerous people of all stripes. But Republicans, unlike Democrats, are actively encouraging violence, posing with guns in incendiary ads that speak of “hunting” opponents, or depict shooting actors who play Biden and Pelosi. Plus, there’s QAnon and the election lies.”

Still more: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“When a Supreme Court justice was threatened, Democrats didn’t just condemn it, they passed a law which Biden signed to give them more protection and security. This isn’t remotely a both sides thing. Which Biden adviser called to behead a public health official? Get real.”

Finally:

“Regardless, I fear that a) there will be assassinations; and b) political violence will be a routine feature of US political life, particularly around elections, for the foreseeable future. It’s a really dark place for our politics and it’s being caused, mostly, by Republicans.”

A Trump supporter attempted to assassinate a Congressional leader. That should be seismic political news. And yet, it’s just another news story. The growing awareness that we are no longer willing to settle policy disagreements with elections will dismantle the American experiment.

Time to wake up America! You only have a few days left to vote. You only have a few days to turn the tide on the MAGA movement. To help you wake up, listen to Jerry Lee do something you’ve probably haven’t heard.

Here’s “Me and Bobby McGee” a tune written by Kris Kristofferson and Fred Foster. It was originally performed by Roger Miller, but we all remember Janis Joplin’s cover of the song, recorded a few days before her death in October 1970.

In 1971, Jerry Lee took Kristofferson’s song and turned it into something only Jerry Lee could do:

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Letter From London

The Daily Escape:

Suite, Bloomsbury Hotel, London England – October 2022 iPhone photo by Wrongo

This isn’t how Wrongo and Ms. Right usually travel. We landed in London after a two-hour delay taking off from Newark Airport in NJ. So we were pretty tired when we got to the Bloomsbury, our favorite hotel over here. That led to another two-hour delay because they didn’t have the room we had specified. So after a few curt words from Wrongo, and support from our friends at Goodspeed, we got this spectacular upgrade above. It’s about three times the size of the room we thought we were getting. We plan to enjoy it to the fullest.

The Bloomsbury Hotel began life in 1928 as a YWCA. It is located in the Bloomsbury district of London, on the same block as the British Museum and a short walk from the theaters in London’s West End. The Irish poet Seamus Heaney was a long-term resident of the hotel. He donated many first edition books to what is now named the hotel’s Seamus Heaney library. Our suite has a portrait of Heaney painted by Ann Witheridge in its entrance.

By the time you are reading this, Rishi Sunak is the UK’s newest Prime Minister. He’s the youngest UK PM since Napoleonic times. He is also the first PM of color in UK history. Nobody misses the departed Liz Truss, and most feel a sense of relief with Sunak, although it can be difficult to see much ideological difference between them. He’s a Brexiteer, and a pro-growth fiscal conservative at a time when inflation is rampant, and economic growth is low. Most citizens are shaking their heads about how they came to have a series of incompetent governments.

Sunak is also a laissez-faire true believer. He’s wealthy, and a solid Tory Party company man. We’ll see if a company man can turn his country around in the face of the ideological splits within the Tory Party, and the need to help the faltering UK economy.

Soaring inflation and increased government borrowing usually means a government must tax more. But the Torys are like the US Republican Party, believing that tax cuts resolve all economic problems. As expected, Sunak’s economic improvement plan relies on cutting the country’s debt while not lowering taxes. Their austerity plan won’t add jobs or cut inflation, so hang on for another wild neoliberal ride.

Our purpose in visiting London is to see plays. Sometimes they illustrate interesting social differences between Broadway and the West End. First, we saw “Get up, Stand up, the Bob Marley Musical”. The music was great as expected, but one difference was that the audience in the expensive seats in the front rows of the orchestra (called the stalls in England) was about 20% Black, something that you would rarely see on Broadway. Make of that what you will.

The second show we saw was “Marvellous”, a play about a person with disabilities who has an improbable and successful life. Neil Baldwin is a person who transcended learning difficulties to be awarded a British Empire Medal by HRH Queen Elizabeth II in 2019 and an honorary degree from a prestigious university.

With all the laughter and slapstick, you almost don’t notice the questions Marvellous raises about the terrible treatment of people with learning disabilities. We have the same problem in the US.

If you think we’re farther ahead, please consider the media’s reaction to stroke victim Democrat John Fetterman after his debate with Republican Dr. Oz. Axios delivered the conventional wisdom about someone who’s different:

”Capitol Hill’s reaction to the Pennsylvania Senate debate was brutal for Democratic nominee John Fetterman, from Democrats and Republicans alike.”

Axios went on to say that Fetterman struggled at times to respond to the moderators’ questions. So the narrative became someone with a career as a glib television star vs. a big bear of a guy who is recovering from a stroke.

A snake-oil salesman vs. a guy who actually has experience in governing and politics. And who does our worse than shit media say looked bad? The guy with aphasia.

Obviously, because he isn’t like the rest of us.

Our media, which normally covers debates solely to promote the zingers, managed to overlook the one good zinger in the Fetterman/Oz debate. From Fetterman:

“Why don’t you pretend that you live in Vermont, instead of Pennsylvania, and run again against Bernie Sanders? Because all you can do is talk about Bernie Sanders.”

Because of Fetterman’s aphasia, there were times when he didn’t answer questions very well. Because of Oz’s dishonesty, there were times when he didn’t answer questions at all.

Fetterman can overcome his aphasia and serve PA well in the US Senate. Oz will never be anything but a con man.

From 3,500 miles away, it increasingly looks like the fate of American democracy rests on a few contingent events coming out the right way on November 8.

Sure would be helpful if the media played it straight.

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Monday Wake Up Call – October 3, 2022

The Daily Escape:

Baxter Lake, Baxter State Park, ME – September 2022 photo by Laura Zamfirescu Photography

“We moved to a better neighborhood”. That’s the story of millions of Americans whose lives tracked toward success. In a way, that IS the American Dream, to escape from where you are to someplace better, safer, more upscale.

That version of the American Dream dovetails with our 21st century desire to be isolated from other people. We order dinner from Doordash. We buy housewares from Amazon. We buy automobiles online to avoid talking to the manager at the dealer.

Many of Wrongo’s grandkids say that they hate people, meaning that they only wish to speak with their friends, and not to anyone who might be their customer.

So is alone in a better neighborhood now the American Dream? What about billionaires? They already live in the best neighborhoods. They have battalions of staff insulating them from the rest of us. Have you ever had a meeting with a multi-billionaire? It isn’t an easy thing to do. Over the years, Wrongo has worked for two of them, and they were perfectly fine individuals. But they were completely insulated.

And they made their money the old-fashioned way, inheriting it from their Robber Barron parents.

Today’s mega-rich have mostly found ways to extract value from consumers and businesses via software. Take a look at Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index. It’s a list dominated by people who have made money from the digital technology revolution.

And what are they doing with all this wealth? Many are quietly plotting their own survival against the world’s demise. Wrongo heard an interview with Douglas Rushkoff, author of “Survival of the Richest: Escape Fantasies of the Tech Billionaires”. Rushkoff is Professor at City University of NY, also a founder of the Laboratory for Digital Humanism, and a fellow at the Institute for the Future.

Rushkoff explained that billionaires worried about the end of the world know their money will likely be of little value. They’re thinking about political instability, social breakdown, and environmental catastrophe. A number of the world’s richest people are preparing for these events by building bunkers in New Zealand and in other remote locations. From Rushkoff:

“Most of these guys that we think are going to save us are actually wishing for the apocalypse. This is not just something that they fear. It’s something that at this point they’re ready to bring on.”

The book came from a meeting between Rushkoff and five billionaires at a desert resort. The topic? How to survive the catastrophe they know is coming. More from Rushkoff:

“And they spent the rest of the hour asking me really to…test their survival strategies…Do we go underground? Do I get an island?….What about space? And we ended up spending the majority of the hour on the single question, How do I maintain control of my security force after my money is worthless?…..because they’ve all got this money, they’ve…contracted Navy SEALs to come out to their compounds. But then they’re thinking, well, what do we do if our money’s worthless, then why are the Navy SEALs not just going to kill us and take all the stuff?”

Remember the back-yard bomb shelters of the 1950s: With that threat, how big would you want your bomb shelter to be? How luxurious and well-guarded? If the world were destroyed, you would try to live in that shelter full-time. Same thing with these billionaires.

Think about it: They want to use 21st century technology to revive a 13th century social order and impose it on the land and people who live around their protected fortresses. Missing from the plans of tech billionaires? Ideas to stop authoritarianism, decrease inequality, heal social divides, or slow climate change. Rushkoff explains:

“Even if we call them genius technologists, most of them were plucked from college when they were freshmen….They came up with some idea in their dorm room before they’d taken history, or economics, or ethics, or philosophy classes, and so they lack the wisdom needed to oversee their own perverse amounts of wealth.”

So maybe we shouldn’t rely on these guys to protect our future. In fact, Rushkoff says that these people who have the most power to change our current trajectory have no interest in doing so.

At this point in human history, making money is all that matters. In capitalist societies your worth is directly correlated to how much money you have. Everybody understands this. Billionaires are the most prominent symptom, but they aren’t the disease. Capitalism is the disease.

Time to wake up America! There is absolutely zero downside to relieving these people of a big slice of their wealth and putting it toward rehabbing our society. To help you wake up, watch, and listen to Carlos and Cindy Blackman Santana lead a Playing for Change global group of musicians in “Oye Como Va”:

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Why Democrats Haven’t Closed the Midterm Gap

The Daily Escape:

Sunrise, Duxbury, MA – September 2022 photo by Juergen Roth Photography

Fall is here and the midterms are 41 days away. And CBS reports that the Republicans have a lead, but it’s still shrinking. CBS’s analysts still have the GOP picking up the House, but it is still within reach:

“While they’re still in a very good position to capture a House majority, that majority looks narrower today than it ever has, having ticked down for the second straight month to 223 seats in our model estimate. Republicans were at 226 in August and 230 in July.”

CBS says that voters think the stakes are high, and for many it’s more than the pocketbook issues of gas prices and inflation. BTW, Wrongo paid $2.95/gal on Monday. Here’s a chart from CBS:

Voters believe by two to one that a Republican Congress would lead to women getting fewer rights and freedoms than they have now.

Other polls talk about whether people view the Parties’ candidates favorably or unfavorably, the WaPo reviewed more than 20 polls across the swing states including Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. And in most cases, the Trump-aligned candidates have huge unfavorability deficits, but these popularity gaps are mostly larger than the expected voting margins in the actual head-to-head contests.

Let’s go back to the CBS poll for the reason why the Democrats are still trailing:

Despite having their voters’ enthusiasm grow, Democrats are still less likely than Republicans to say they’ll definitely vote. They haven’t closed that gap.

That makes the campaign right now about the Dems defining what the contest is about for their own voters and for independents. Once Dems get beyond the voters most concerned with abortion, they still have work to do making this midterm election look like other midterms where they’ve won.

The WaPo’s Aaron Blake tells us that the difference is that Republican and right-leaning swing voters see an obnoxious Republican and think: He may be a jerk, but he’s our jerk.

Democrats don’t do that. They fight among themselves about the virtue of their candidates.

Republicans have much more party loyalty than Democrats. Steve M. at No More Mister Nice Blog says it’s not hard to see why:

“Their favorite media sources have engaged in pure cheerleading for their party (and relentless demonization of the other party) for decades. The rest of the media is described as “liberal,” but it’s always ready to shiv a Democrat.”

He asks:

“Was there a single positive news story published about Joe Biden between the fall of Afghanistan and the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act?”

So it’s not surprising that these Republican jerks can be competitive.

Republicans are pretty much all on the same page now. They are a minority Party at the national level and that requires them to rely on Party unity to regain power.

Wrongo doesn’t know what to tell you. Everyone needs to communicate that if the Republican Party takes control of both Houses of Congress they will:

  • Work to make voting more difficult or meaningless. They just voted against disclosing dark money in our elections, thereby reinforcing the damage done by Citizens United.
  • Try to have their Republican legislatures decide who won an election by nullifying the power of state supreme courts to check rogue legislatures.
  • Work to weaken Social Security and Medicaid.
  • Try to pass a national abortion ban. And if that’s not enough, they are leaning towards a ban on contraception.
  • Try to end the right to same sex marriage.
  • Work to make America a one-religion state.

None of the above is an exaggeration. Republicans are pushing all of these terrible things right now.

Beyond that, here’s something to remind your friends who still aren’t sure how they’ll vote: Republicans historically don’t care about the issues they keep going on about on cable news, or in their incessant negative election ads. And they won’t do anything to address them if they win.

They have no real governing agenda.  And there’s only one way to stop them.

Get out the vote.

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