October 2008. The idea of Bitcoin is formulated for the first time, with a pseudonymous Satoshi Nakamoto dropping its white paper. It may seem appealing on a surface level to control consensus from the seat of a large custodial exchange, but it is a power that is best spurned in...
Voting Rights
A conservative justice on the Supreme Court asserted after the overturning of Roe v. Wade that other rights were safe, including LGBTQIA rights, birth control, and interracial marriage. Chief Justice John Roberts, who has long had a bee in his racial bonnet, started his quest in 2013 by eliminating section...
There is a funny and oft-repeated line from the standup comedy act of Chris Rock— for some (expletive) they supposed to do! Rock’s punchline was a rebuff to one wanting congratulations for accomplishing their fundamental responsibility. Republican representatives Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger are surfing the liberal wave because they chose...
“I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office,...
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...
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...
Either the political acumen of the voter is in dire need of reeducation, or Democrats need lessons in exploiting a golden opportunity. Republicans publicly pull off political tricks without recrimination. They manipulate the public with chicanery, walk away, and brag about it later. At the beginning of the Biden administration,...
If you have seen the movie Birds of Prey (And the Fabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn), you know the underlying theme was her discovering her power amidst a world of insanity, crime, and social degradation; hence her emancipation. That brings me to the current impasse in the Senate, with...
…suppressing your opposition with power; strong regimentation of society and economy, and dictatorial power- Fascism In the collegial setting, politics is taught as a science. It is meant to be an apolitical study based upon history or comparison, its global effects i.e. international implications, and accepted theory. Although modern fascism...
I took a moment, in the interest of “fair and balanced” reporting, to tune into Fox News’ coverage of the opening of the 1/6 Committee hearing, last week. Of course, the scrolling chyron across the bottom of the screen calling it the Pelosi Committee was an obvious attempt to prejudice...
Layaway, on-time, and paying-something-down-on-it have been very familiar phrases in black, brown, and poor neighborhoods for generations; credit was for the people who did not need it. Financial freedom because of race, religion, and status was prohibitive for countless numbers of Americans and immigrants. The constant pressure of having to...
I was born in the 1950s when it was not illegal for black people in the south to vote—it was suicide. Pseudo-laws, tests, intimidation, hoods, ropes, and guns were the anti-democracy tactics of the day. Southern state officials could not legitimately ban black people from voting, so the strategy was...
There is a lot of media hand-wringing over a little mind with tiny thoughts who has been elevated into a big political voice by the liberal press. Fox News propagandist Tucker Carlson, a distant heir to the Swanson frozen-food fortune, is as slimy and indigestible as a pile of cream...
It is usually a minefield of critical backlash, and what about(s), when you compare the oppression of Jews to the descendants of enslaved Africans in America, but I am going to wade onto the battlefield. What I am not going to do is use the comparison of the holocaust and...
I don’t know if this statement has been diarized, my apologies, but it bears repeating often, so if anyone missed it. The Threats to American Democracy and the Need for National Voting and Election Administration Standards The Bolding is mine Introduction We, the undersigned, are scholars of democracy who have...
The addition of the 1982 amendments to the Voting Rights Act was a turning point in terms of minority representation. Redistricting is the process of drawing electoral district lines every ten years intended to bring about racially proportional representation. While its purpose was to give weight to minority votes, it...
The simplest explanation for lawyer Michael Godwin’s law is that the longer a debate or disagreement extends, it will eventually devolve into an unfounded comparison to Hitler and the Nazis. Godwin’s Law is a current topic because of Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA). Marjorie Taylor Greene may have decisively proved...
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...
Most things in America are solved by either common sense, solemnity, or time. The one exception is race. Historically both the Democratic and Republican party has used race as a means of power and control. Although the Federalist Party is long dead, the current Republicans are fighting, legislating, and restoring...
Like ALEC writing legislation for a lazy GOP, Heritage Action is providing the same “song sheets” for state legislatures trying to suppress voting rights. Heritage Action says it wrote “8 key provisions” in Georgia voter suppression law, “19 provisions” in Texas House bill & “3 provisions” of Iowa law. Dark...
Sometimes making fun of Republicans is like shooting fish in a barrel. Actually, no. They’re not fish so much as some kind of animal that can’t swim … or crawl out of a barrel. It’s like watching a drunk, elderly orangutan drown in a barrel. Yeah, that’s what I’m saying. I...
So this happened yesterday: Glenn Youngkin, a wealthy first-time candidate who walked a line between his party’s Trump-centric base and appeals to business interests, won the Republican nomination for governor of Virginia on Monday. He heads into a general election in one of only two states choosing their governors in...
Received this e-mail today from former presidential candidate, Rep. Beto O’Rourke’s (D. TX) organization, Powered by People: This is the most important moment to fight back against voter suppression in Texas. Yesterday, Beto and Powered by People volunteers joined lawmakers, advocates, business leaders, and concerned voters in Austin to rally...
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...
Received this e-mail today from former presidential candidate, Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D. TX), on behalf of his organization, Powered by People: Did you see the news this week? Texas gained the most residents in the past decade of any state according to the 2020 census – and as a result,...
Just wanted to share this: Texas Senator Ted Cruz was not a fan of a Tuesday Daily Show segment and he let host Trevor Noah know it. The bit was about Congressional reapportionment due to population shifts in the U.S. Those shifts are causing New York to lose a U.S. House seat while Texas picks up...
Senator John Kennedy (R-LA) was born in the heart of the old Democratic south. He is a devout southerner, born in Mississippi, and attended college at both the University of Virginia and Vanderbilt in Tennessee. At age sixty-nine, I believe it is safe to say that the one-time southern Democrat,...
Received this e-mail today from U.S. Senator Raphael Warnock’s (D. GA) re-election campaign: This is urgent: Republican lawmakers in Georgia just enacted one of the most restrictive voter suppression bills in the country – and with the Senate now back in session, I need your grassroots support to fight back immediately....
Received this e-mail today from U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen’s (D. MD) re-election campaign: Even as we work to pass historic legislation in the U.S. Senate where Republican control has prevented progress for so long, we need to stay laser-focused on GOP efforts to steal the next election by suppressing...
Received this e-mail today from former presidential candidate, Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D. TX), and his organization, Powered By People: This week, HB 6, an egregious voter suppression bill, took a huge step toward becoming law in Texas. This bill along with SB 7 – which passed the State Senate last...
We’re now at that strange nexus where Brian Kilmeade’s attempt to pin Prince Phil’s death on the granddaughter-in-law fits other anti-semitic and racist tropes fronted by Fox News. This because of counting artifacts in threes. “The New York Time’s (NYT) Upshot examined the statistical prevalence of celebrity deaths in threesomes. How did they do...
Wait, I’m confused. I thought we lived in a free-market democracy in which corporations are “people” with sacrosanct “opinions” (which, for some reason, usually come in the form of gobs and gobs of campaign cash). So when corporations literally write their own legislation, it’s A-okay. That’s just what the Founding Fathers...
“As in the Times Op-Ed from which the book originated, the title refers to the results of studies conducted in Germany from the mid-nineteen-eighties onward, which reported, among other intriguing findings, that eighty per cent of East German women always experienced orgasm during sex, compared to sixty-three per cent of...
Previous Guy has been desperate for a regular social media channel to wreak his nonsense. Likely he’ll violate the rules again because we’ve seen his poor impulse control and then there’s the Big Lie. Tech experts are skeptical about plans for a Trump social media platform, if only because justice...
This is a bad place in history. Apparently half of the GQP thinks the 1/6 insurrection was left-wing activists trying to make Trump “look bad”, accordingly, MSM thinks Biden has “tamed” the left. The administration’s warm relationship with the left is one of the most surprising aspects of the Biden presidency, particularly...
Here’s some big news out of Florida: 2022 Florida Governor GE: Ron DeSantis (R-inc) 45%Nikki Fried (D) 45%@StPetePolls/@Fla_Pol 3/22-24https://t.co/HgtQTMyV26 #FLgov — Political Polls (@Politics_Polls) March 25, 2021 Should Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried run for Florida Governor, she starts in a statistical tie with Gov. Ron DeSantis. That’s according to a...
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...
Received this e-mail from U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen’s (D. MD) re-election campaign: The last four years have dramatically demonstrated just how much work we need to do to restore and strengthen our democracy, and address critical national priorities that have been trapped in gridlock for years. The sad truth...
Big news today out Nevada: x Mitch McConnell is determined to exploit the filibuster and fight progress, no matter what. If he wants to block action on voting rights, the American people should get to see his obstruction. We need filibuster reform. https://t.co/o6v8WwmmoU— Senator Cortez Masto (@SenCortezMasto) March 9, 2021...
Because Trumpists are all about the cosplay: Person Woman Man Camera TV. Aren’t we in an age where US Senators pretend to be patriots while supporting an election nullification, and there’s all those 2020 instances of voter fraud, not. No evidence for the widespread right-wing lie that Antifa members disguised...
Every Republican in the Arizona Senate co-sponsored a resolution demanding the Supervisor of Elections for Arizona’s largest county, Maricopa, to be arrested for declaring Joe Biden the winner of the 2020 election and for not complying with their illegal demand to turn over election equipment and mail-in ballots to a Trump-allied firm...
Received this e-mail from MoveOn.org: Dear MoveOn member, This is a make-it-or-break-it week for Democrats, who are poised to start voting on President Joe Biden's $1.9 trillion COVID relief bill, including an increase in the federal minimum wage from $7.25 an hour.1 All 50 senators in the Democratic caucus are needed to...