When Will We Have Lost It?

 It’s tough these days reading that day’s news. I opened a NY Times article about their new Mayor, Eric Adams. Formerly the Brooklyn Borough president, Adams seems bent on becoming the Clarence Thomas of Urban Mayors.  He has recently appointed people to leading positions who are fundamentally anti-LGBTQ, and one of his close BFFs seems connected with QAnon.  Nice, huh?? This from the mayor of New York City for God’s sake.

Oh, and then there’s that Ukraine thing, where Vlad the Impaler has now launched his long promised invasion of Ukraine, preceded by a declaration that two of Ukraine’s provinces are actually independent, and maybe even part of Russia. Makes me wonder when Vlad will declare other states part of Russia.  Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia?? Scandinavia BEWARE.  Vlad apparently yearns for the good old days when the USSR saw the world as its oyster.  He, like Donald Trump, really wants to be King Vlad.  

But then, back at home, we have the Governor of Texas (VladLand), who recently has created legislation making it illegal for Transkids to compete in athletics in any capacity other than the gender to which they were born. Yeah, you go Abbott. Another Vlad in the making. And this is on top of Texas’ law banning abortion, where he basically puts a price on any activity connected with providing or supporting abortions. Giving directions to an Uber driver who is driving a woman in search of an abortion? On your head. Pay up Dude.  The sheer stupidity and nastiness of Texas beggar’s belief.

And that makes me wonder, when will we see the end to America?  What might be the signals?

Taxes – the fact that billionaires might pay less tax than ordinary middle class folks seems a biggie. Republicans are constantly seeking to increase taxes on the Middle Classes and decrease taxes on the Uberwealthy—what happens when you are paid serfs of the Rich. 

Voting – Republican states are all seeking to make it more difficult for ordinary folks to vote. They really hate it when ordinary people vote Democrat. But increasingly, they seem to just not like voting period. They realize they can’t come out and just say it—“Stop Voting people, we Hate it when people vote!” So, instead they are making it increasingly difficult for ordinary folks to vote.  Now voting is a bedrock principle of our democracy. So voting seems a biggie. If we can’t vote, then how do we operate a democracy? Well, maybe we don’t.  Maybe, instead, we just give up and allow the current crop of pseudo-legislators to stay in office.  And maybe we just give them different titles, you know, like, Hmmm, Barons, or Dukes, or even Princes. Yeah, Princes. That would be nice. Prince Abbott.  And The Donald would of course be King Donald I.  And Ivanka would become the Queen Consort—Melania would be banished to MaraLago. She is so last century.

Military – Our Military is among the finest in the world. They have kept our nation free of POS like Vlad the Impaler (remember Adolph?? Vlad loved Adolph).  So, I begin wondering how the republicans, after they assume control, will move to convert our Military to a force that now monitors Domestic affairs.  Yeah, right after we “Defund the Police” we will need a replacement. And what better than the 101^st Airborne Division?  So, a really good signal that the end (of America) is near, would be that the republicans take over control of the entire military, and convert it into a Domestic force.

Freedom of Religion – see, whereas an increasing number of Americans want this concept to be “Freedom FROM Religion” our right-wing republicans want to merge Christianity with Government.  All Government laws and regulations should represent good Christian Values –you know, like Banning abortions and all Trans folks from existing.  And each and every Sunday, all good citizens would have to attend the Christian Church of their heart’s desire and contribute some mandatory dollar support to that church’s coffers.  And then I guess we would see a scrambling among the Jerry Falwell’s, and Frankie Graham’s of our world to determine who gets the big job, you know The RepubliPope of America.  Won’t that be nice??

Books and Banning – Maybe instead of these tiresome Book Banning parades, we might see a Federal law passed that requires all books, before they are published, to receive a Seal of the Happy PillowGuy’s Approval. And all existing books would have to show a similar seal before they could be sold.  Wouldn’t that be great???  See, then we would all be free of those tiresome books suggesting a catastrophic Climate Future, or describing all those fake news stories about slavery in America, or really any form of racial bigotry. See, we know such things do not exist in our WonderLand, so why would we allow books to counter that reality??  Think how happy our schoolkids would be without all that conflict.

Fake News Banned – so much Fake News, so little time. Where will it all end? So, maybe a good start would be to introduce new laws/regulations that prevent any news outlets from broadcasting negative or “Fake” news. So, perhaps like the Book Czar, we would need to create a Public News Czar who would oversee all news programs and news staffing to ensure that all received a Seal of Approval from the Czar, maybe Tucker Carlson, or Laura Whatshername could be the first Czar/Czarina.  Gradually, I imagine we would only need one such outlet. I mean, who needs competing News sources, right???

So, there is a decent beginning of the end of America. If you see such things beginning to occur, you can rush to support their continuation.  You likely by then will not be able to VOTE, but voting was such a hassle anyway, right?  I mean, reading those endless ballots, trying to decide among competing claims as to who would be the biggest idiot in office. That was just too tiresome, right?  So, if you notice such changes, I guess you should invite your neighbor in for a nice glass of wine, assuming the neighbor is the “right” kind of person don’t you know.

So, Ta ta for now. And if the Sun is going down near you, then Night Night, and Don’t let the Bedbugs Bite is my best advice.

What Can One Say?

 It is getting increasingly difficult to write my blog lately. Why? Well, part of it is my age, well past my “sell-by” date. And why is age a factor in whether I write, or about what subjects I write? Well, it seems that I can only complain about an issue so many times and then I tire of it, and it of me.  I mean how long can you go on writing about Trump’s continued Organized Crime Gang behavior?  It seems that nearly every other day, a new revelation pops into our consciousness, and yet another of his past criminal acts comes to light and is now likely to lead him to difficulty. But then we go on, and he goes on whining about Fake News. Increasingly, he wants his attackers charged with some illegal behavior and jailed, or maybe even killed.  See, he no longer even pretends to be civilized. He seems to think he is an actual monarch, and not even a constitutional monarch, but an Absolute Monarch bound only by his own rules.

And so we go on. And my pen is stilled, because there is no longer anything I can say that is new.

And then I read a story about the West Coast drought that is now being compared to a drought that may have occurred over 1200 years ago.  Or, at the least, it seems to be the worst drought in over 1200 years. See, we used to say things like, “wow, we haven’t seen a dry spell like this since 1980”, or some such retrievable date. But we seem to have stopped saying the Climate Change thing. Apparently, the climate has changed, and we are now in some new era, one we have never seen before. We speak of droughts that may deliver us new Sahara deserts, and we speak of coastal erosion that will deliver sea-level rise of 1-2 feet. Now that may not seem like much, but apparently many coastal regions will either disappear altogether, or will become seriously flooded. I gather, any town or city along any of our coast lines will be partly or wholly under water. So, pay attention New York, East Second Avenue may soon be under water. I imagine that means that MaraLago will be under water and Miami will simply disappear, along with Key West.  So, you folks living in Florida might want to consider moving to Appalachia sooner rather than later.

Oh and remember that pandemic thingie? Well, guess what? It ain’t going away any time soon. Oh yeah, those red states are shedding themselves of those damnable mask mandates. But really all that will accomplish is that more folks will wind up in the hospital, or dead from COVID.  See the “red” states, meaning republican, or Trumpies, don’t care about protecting their citizens any longer. Well, to be fair, they never really did care anyway, trapped as they were in paying obeisance to their rich owners. But they used to at least pretend. No longer sadly.  And so the political wars over a disease state will continue, because it pleases the Trumpies.

And I guess the Reddies are becoming tired of yelling about mask mandates that strip their freedoms to act stupidly. And so they have descended to yelling about books. Hard to imagine but it’s true. Several hundred books are now on someone’s Banned List. A few are listed here:

Maus, The Hunger Games, 1619, I know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Harry Potter, A Wrinkle in Time, Are You There God, It’s Me, Slaughterhouse Five, 1984, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Handmaids Tale, The Great Gatsby, To Kill a Mockingbird, Animal Farm, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, A Farewell to Arms. Someone even added Ulysses to the list for God’s sake. And I doubt that anyone in charge of book banning has ever even succeeded in reading Ulysses.  So what is this book banning all about? Well, it seems to give the religious right yet another opportunity to demonstrate that they really wish to eliminate civilization as we know it, and return us perhaps to some 12^th century lifestyle.  And this uncivil crowd also is pursuing abortion banning. Over 20 states now are poised to ban abortions once our SCOTUS eliminates Roe V. Wade as the law of our land, which should be any day now.  They call themselves “Pro-Life”, but really they seem to be “Anti-Sex”, since they care not about any of the children that occur as a result of their bans.

And I await with great anticipation what the Trumpies will next pursue. I am thinking that they will begin to act to try to make it illegal to forego religion. Yeah, surely that’s next, so all agnostics and atheists beware. They will be after your bodies really soon.  And then America can move smoothly into the 12^th century. No public education, surely a monarch at the top of our government, perhaps even an Absolute Monarch, ahh, yes, King Donald I, with Princess Ivanka waiting in the wings.

And so life goes on in 21^st century America.  We could of course vote to change all that, but the reddies are working busily to eliminate our ability to vote. First, all those folks of color, then maybe all those old folks can be eliminated as voters.  Then . . . ahh what comes next?

Stay tuned to the next installment of America in the 12^th Century.

87 and Counting

 About a week ago, while on my exercise walk along North Union, I tripped and fell. But more, I fell onto my face, having failed to raise my arms quickly enough. So, much blood and a lot of angst by wife and daughter, and with the help of some neighbors, I managed to make it to one of our local docs, who inspected my remains and cleaned me up for a new day.  I was “good to go”, aside from the bruises and minor scarring from the fall.  I really do need to be more careful.  It made me wonder, is tripping and falling onto my head my hidden exit plan??  We all have one I understand, just that none of us knows what our specific plan is. Makes me wonder, is my plan prescribed by the dude up in those clouds, and are we really all just idiot-savants in some Godly video game?? And does it make any difference if we are??

Things to ponder, as I sit here wondering, whatever happened to humankind?  What do I mean? Hmmm. Well, first and perhaps most important to us Ammurricans, is the Trump thingie.  And what is that you ask? Well, it turns out that, beyond his corruption, his utter stupidity, his racism, his misogyny, that he is basically a Traitor. Yeah, all of the documents now available to those who care tell us that he actively planned that insurrection thing, setting in motion many arms that were aimed at reversing the election results. See, Trump really does not like it when he loses (well, technically he loses all the time, but still). Since he doesn’t care about the rules of Democracy (well any rules) he was fully prepared to overturn the results by any means, including violence.  And that’s called an act of Treason.

So, we know all that, right?? Well, yes we do, but it also turns out that many, many Ammurricans really do not care about such things. They continue to support Trump. Really people??? After all we know, you want this dude to lead our government??  Oh, yeah, that’s right. You hate our government don’t you?

And then we have the “principled” republicans, like Susan Collins. One would imagine that she would rule out supporting Trump in 2024, right?? Well, wrong. Although she doesn’t say she “will support” Trump, she also refuses to say that she “will not support” Trump. Turns out, “It depends”. And on what does it depend? Well, apparently, it depends on whether he is actually running. If he succeeds in kicking all other candidates out of the way, and that seems likely assuming he is not yet dead, then it would seem that Madame Collins might well support him. Huh??? Susan Collins, who voted to convict Trump for Impeachment, will now vote for him should he be running for President?  Yep. And that’s the way it goes folks. Ammurrica has now become Texas.  The country no longer has any scruples. No moral or ethical principles guide our political leaders. Because if a Democrat stands against Trump, well that's just a Dem being political. And they’ll do anything to nail Trump, right? But if a republican stands FOR Trump, well they are being principled.

And so it goes, crashing towards our next election in 2022, you know that election that may determine who controls the Senate and House.  Yeah, that election.

And so I go about my business daily. We get up, make a nice breakfast, with a nice cappuccino, look at each other in the eyes, and say “To Us”. And then we eat, look at some e-mails, and then wander about the day, with Carol Quilting for the sick kids at the Jeff Gordon Children’s Center, and me just wandering in the desert of my aging thoughts.  We no longer do anything that involves other people, unless we arm ourselves with masks (yeah, yeah, we are fully vaxxed). But in olden tymes, we used to actually, you know, Work. Now, we are both old, and work is a thing of the past. Now we just sit around “Waiting for God” (remember that British comedic program? ).  But we sit around awaiting the next act of terminal stupidity by someone in the ranks of people formerly known as Americans. And any act even vaguely supportive of Donald Trump is, by definition, an act of terminal stupidity.  It’s now like expecting when Americans will once again vote for, or show support for, the Head of a Mafia gang. “And what makes you support the head of a Mafia Gang sir”? “Well, he really gobsmacked that Democrat didn’t he?  And he now says that he will pardon anyone convicted of a crime, in which that dude expresses support for Trump.  That’s hot stuff huh? Biden would never do that.” See we apparently no longer have any principles, ethical or moral.  And I don’t mean all Americans. No, of course not. But enough that we literally might have yet another Trump presidency . . . well that might be more like a coronation of King Donald I. Ooohhh, think of that. We could have Don Jr. as Crown Prince, Ivanka as the Duchess of MaraLago, and Erik as the Idiot Savant Duke of Trump Tower. Wow, America, won’t you be proud??

And then another day ends in the saga of the Life of Richard Schmidt. And I go back to bed and try to sleep for an hour or two.  Hooray, we survived yet another day in the Wonderland of America.

Ahh, well, maybe next century life will return to America, after the Kingdom of Donald Trump and family is overthrown and a new Democracy begins. Yay! Welcome to that world folks. It’s coming, just not yet.

Oh, and remember there actually is an election in 2022. They all seem a little confused about when and where and who, but it’s coming. Stay Tuned. Maybe by then we will be on COVID Variant 12 which we will call COVAMAGGEDON. So, Think On, and try to stay Sane. It's preferred to the other course that some of us have veered off into.