In nineteen seventy-four, I reached three milestones in my life. In March of that year, I turned eighteen; ten days later, I registered with selective service—conscription ended in 1973, and naively I registered as an independent voter. I remember the sense of power I felt. I could join the military...
Schools
Here’s the latest news out of Pennsylvania: The TV ad is no-holds-barred. It bluntly attacks a decision of the Democratic candidate for Pennsylvania Supreme Court. And on Saturday, the state Bar Association said the spot went too far. The ad says the Democratic contender, Superior Court Judge Maria McLaughlin, “chose...
Beetle-Juice Three Times. Thank Jeebus that cheesehead is not banned from primary and secondary schools in Wisconsin. Because nothing says “Freedom” and “Liberty” like being the language police. If you talk about “spirit murdering” and “action civics” they might even exist. Better to be “un-woke”, because you might develop an “unconscious-bias”. Darn...
With roughly a third of Americans who identify themselves as Republicans, the party bombards us with the term American People at every utterance. With almost 60% of the country fully vaccinated, Republicans say the American People have doubts. Yesterday, Mitch McConnell, in response to questions about the insurrection, said the...
“No, no. There's 52 senators who don't agree, okay, and there's two that want to work something out if possible in a most rational reasonable way.” Joe Manchin fessing up that he and Sinema are Republicans to CNN reporter. Manchin Cheerfully Gives Republicans A Senate Majority (video in link) West Virginia is...
Republicans have proved to be masters at soundbite manipulation. The GOP has gotten, mainly, poor white people in the Red States to oppose Medicare expansion, happily believing that rich people trickling on them will eventually improve their lot. Truth in schools is being portrayed as a threat to whiteness, and...
“…wearing a mask while playing was no different from wearing a parachute while skydiving.” The above quote is purportedly from the late Jacques Plante, former goaltender for the Montreal Canadiens Hockey club when his bravery was questioned for wearing a mask. As absurd as it seems now, there was a...
The latest rabbit punch thrown by the Republican party in the culture bout was to deny Texas children the truth about women’s suffrage and that white supremacy is a bad thing. Besides the obvious moral failure of Texas Republicans, who voted in favor of this measure in the absence of...
Florida bans its schools from teaching critical race theory On Thursday, Florida’s State Board of Education unanimously voted in favor of an amendment banning the teaching of critical race theory in schools throughout the state. The theory, according to PolitiFact, is a collection of ideas about systemic bias and privilege...
It’s sick. So, so sick. But that’s what Republicans are all about these days: inspecting children’s genitals. It’s pretty much all they talk about—when they’re not talking about Mr. Potato Head. And his starchy, androgynous genitalia. They’re so into it, in fact, they’ve passed bills that would allow them to scrutinize any...
These are days fraught with political battles over cultural histories abjuring complexity. Today it’s The Wall Street Journal and the reactionary path to critical race theory, the latest bit of Trumpist ignorance now projected into personnel policies and the larger revisionist history project that would deny the historical relevance of slavery...
Oklahoma’s right-wing politicians would like to erase history because that’s what they do, whether it’s the omission of facts or rewriting them to favor those in power. Historical guilt and its associated media effects cooties can’t be part of public school curricula. H.B. 1775 implies that the past prior to 1776...
Voter rights legislation is winding its way through Congress with the foregone conclusion that Senate Republicans will scuttle it. Equitable voting rights legislation for blacks in America has been a 400-year exercise in hypocrisy. One man, one vote has been turned on its head so often, Ringling Bros. should have...
http://www.cnn.com/… The Food and Drug Administration is giving emergency approval to the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid Vaccine for use in juveniles from 12 to 15 years old. Several of the vaccine manufacturers are conducting limited trials for younger groups. Vaccinations of young people will not only increase the percentage of the population...
Can’t say that I’m surprised by this: Caitlyn Jenner, the former Olympic champion and reality TV personality now running for governor in California, said she opposes transgender girls competing in girls' sports at school. Jenner, a 1976 decathlon gold medalist who came out as a transgender woman in 2015, told...
Ron DeSantis is actually giving Trump a run for his money on dictatorship try outs. Check this out. www.local10.com/… I would assume that includes hurricanes. No emergency shut downs. Gov. Ron DeSantis announced Monday that he is using his executive powers to terminate all local COVID-19 orders, effective immediately. During a...
Generally, Martha Raddatz and other hosts allow Republicans to appear on their shows and lie without challenge. Sen. Barrasso failed this time. Raddatz stop the lie-in-progress See full episodes here. Wyoming Republican Senator John Barrasso is one of the GOP’s more competent liars. Recently, a few hosts have been calling him out....
Received this e-mail today from U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff (D. GA) in support of his colleague, U.S. Senator Raphael Warnock’s (D. GA) re-election campaign: I'm asking you to split $10 between me and Senator Reverend Raphael Warnock so we can ramp up Voter Protection efforts in Georgia, where voting rights...
x Allow me to introduce you to the Governor of Florida… pic.twitter.com/aimVnJhTPD— Wes Davis (he/him) (@WRKwithWes) April 17, 2020 This was from last year and after a full year, he has not learned very much about masks. http://www.abcactionnews.com/… If DeSantis fails to extend the emergency order for another 60 days,...
A new book suggests now the necessity of reexamining the historical materialist project of Walter Benjamin recognizing those moments of historical contact as acts of recognizing the constructed historical object. “Historicism tends to be hermeneutic because it values cautious, rigorous, and contextualized interpretation of information; or relativist, because it rejects notions of universal, fundamental...
Structural change needs to happen, because in community policing, community should precede policing. The paramilitary trend should not be seen as a burgeoning conflict between armed militias, one more official than the other. We need a de-escalation whose goal is the diametric opposite of the 1/6 insurrection. The problem isn't...
Some big news today out of North Carolina: Former North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory’s career in politics is not over. McCrory, a Republican who served one term as the state’s chief executive and 14 years as Charlotte’s mayor, has launched a campaign website announcing his run for North Carolina’s open U.S. Senate...
Received this e-mail today from Governor Tony Evers’ (D. WI) re-election campaign: As someone who believes in science and keeping Wisconsin safe, I have trusted public health experts to guide our decision-making since the beginning of COVID-19. As a result, we’re leading the nation in vaccine distribution and next week...
Here’s some big news today out of Pennsylvania: .@JohnFetterman announces he raised $3.9 million in the first quarter for his Pennsylvania U.S. Senate run, through 140,000 contributions. A big haul of 💰 at an early stage. — Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) April 1, 2021 Lt. Gov. John Fetterman said he raised...
Many times during his reign, Trump could have saved his presidency by taking moderate positions and co-opting the Democrats. He felt, however that he should obey his benefactors like a beta, whether it was the evangelicals and Russia, or Steve Bannon, Paul Manafort, and Mike Flynn. Even in the pandemic,...
The 6th Circuit rules that Shawnee State University violated a professor’s free speech and free expression rights by punishing him for refusing to use a trans student’s preferred pronouns. More lawfare ahead. Apparently a professor’s socratic method (and his religious beliefs) trumps gender expression and public accommodation keeps bigotry in a bathroom...
I wanted to make sure you all saw this: Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet on Wednesday called on the Senate to act in the wake of a mass shooting at a supermarket in his state, asserting in an impassioned speech from the chamber floor that his colleagues have a moral obligation to a generation...
So much thick-headed media activity this past week. OTOH Chuck Todd panders to the center again, or perhaps it's the college drop-out demographic. x A @MeetThePress fail today: talking about anti-Asian violence and racism – without any Asians on the panel. I can’t imagine MTP having a discussion about anti-Black...
The total numbers of vaccinations for Covid-19 exceeded joe Biden’s goal of 100 million in 100 days as of yesterday, and may be in the vicinity of 200 million by the 100th day of his administration. With the 3.1 million vaccinations reported by the CDC yesterday, 68% of all Americans over...
Because armed struggle in the actual 1776 to cancel a monarchy wasn’t enough for one right-wing think tank, the Heritage Foundation’s usual reactionary silliness now extends to the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, apparently because of Biblical miscegeny. x Heritage Foundation mocked for defending British monarchy from American 'radical left”...
BUT HER E-MAILS!!! State superintendent candidate Deborah Kerr solicited clients and organized branding for her private consulting business through her public school district email address, including several times during work hours, prior to her retirement as Brown Deer School District superintendent last year. Emails obtained by the Wisconsin State Journal...
A noted piece of work, State Senator Hensley, a Sons of Confederate Veterans member, decided there were so many new ways to get a KKK founder’s statue to stick around in the usual battles of Tennessee culture. This particular 1978 bust is a Jim Crow monument with marginal historical value other than honoring...
The Atlanta spree killings are unfortunately a story with structural similarity to events elsewhere. How do we know that Robert Long wasn’t on his way to Mar-a-Lago when the cops performed a PIT maneuver on him after he killed eight people. Darn hypotheticals of the culture wars. Mar-a-Lago as spa resort...
We haven’t gotten past the angst-ridden discourse of privilege and buoyancy even in law schools. Then again E. Jean Carroll really wants that DNA sample from Trump and only good lawyers are going to make that happen. The Georgetown law school said Sandra A. Sellers, an adjunct professor, had been terminated,...