Did We Move, Or Did The Scale Shift?

Posted on March 5, 2023 by jilldennison under education, History, Personal, Political commentary, Racism & Bigotry, Social commentary

I don’t think most of us change our views much during the course of our lifetime. Oh sure, as we age, as we learn new things, learn about history, about political and social ideologies, are exposed to new experiences, we may shift our viewpoints, but I don’t think we do much of a swing from the time we were young. When I focus on young people in my ‘good people’ posts, I always have the feeling that these people, some as young as five or six years old, are going to grow up to be awesome adults with humanitarian values. We are who we are, and while our views may shift, I don’t think the core of us changes much over time. Cruel children grow into cruel adults, children who have compassion as children, typically grow into kind, compassionate adults.

I grew up in the 1950s, came of age in the 1960s during the Civil Rights movement, and for as long as I can remember, I’ve been appalled and disgusted by man’s inhumanity to man, by the depths of cruelty of which the human species is capable. When I was very young, I asked questions … LOTS of questions! Drove my parents to drink, I did! I stopped asking questions about religion, for I figured out early on that there were no answers, but I continued to ask questions about other things, like why my best friend, whose skin just happened to be brown, couldn’t be in our family Christmas picture that would be sent to my grandmother. She was, in my book, part of our family. Or why certain people had to sit in one part of a restaurant while others sat in another. I didn’t know the words ‘racism’ or ‘bigotry’, but I saw that different people were treated differently, and I didn’t like it, didn’t understand it.

So, if one must use labels, I suppose I’ve always been liberal-minded. I don’t think that in the “land of milk and honey”, the “land of opportunity”, anybody should be homeless or have to put their children to bed hungry at night. I think the more education we can give our young people, the better equipped they will be to deal with the challenges ahead and help make the world a better place. And I think education through college should be affordable and available to every single person. I think great wealth is the most useless waste of resources – resources that could be saving lives and benefitting far more people. Those are, of course, liberal ideas, but no different than I’ve believed for all of my adult life.

However, while at one time I was just left of center in socio-political ideology, today I and my views are called “far left”. I’ve wondered about this for some time, had a vague notion that it was the ‘right’ pushing the left further from the center, and last night I found this clip by Robert Reich that explains it perfectly and makes much sense. Take a look … see what you think.

Where Does It End? Or Does It?

Posted on August 20, 2022 by jilldennison under Bits 'n Pieces, Election 2020, Election 2022, Election 2024, History, Law and justice, Political commentary, Racism & Bigotry, Social commentary

Today I share with you an excerpt from an opinion column by Dana Milbank in The Washington Post earlier this month. The article, which is adapted from Milbank’s book, “The Destructionists: The Twenty-Five Year Crack-Up of the Republican Party”, is too lengthy for me to repost in its entirety, but is well worth the read, so I encourage you to read ‘the rest of the story’. Meanwhile, here is a brief excerpt …

The GOP is sick. It didn’t start with Trump — and won’t end with him.

Dana Milbank

4 August 2022

Much has been made of the ensuing polarization in our politics, and it’s true that moderates are a vanishing breed. But the problem isn’t primarily polarization. The problem is that one of our two major political parties has ceased good-faith participation in the democratic process. Of course, there are instances of violence, disinformation, racism and corruption among Democrats and the political left, but the scale isn’t at all comparable. Only one party fomented a bloody insurrection and even after that voted in large numbers (139 House Republicans, a two-thirds majority) to overturn the will of the voters in the 2020 election. Only one party promotes a web of conspiracy theories in place of facts. Only one party is trying to restrict voting and discredit elections. Only one party is stoking fear of minorities and immigrants.

Republicans have become an authoritarian faction fighting democracy — and there’s a perfectly logical reason for this: Democracy is working against Republicans. In the eight presidential contests since 1988, the GOP candidate has won a majority of the popular vote only once, in 2004. As the United States approaches majority-minority status (the White population, 76 percent of the country in 1990, is now 58 percent and will drop below 50 percent around 2045), Republicans have become the voice of White people, particularly those without college degrees, who fear the loss of their way of life in a multicultural America. White grievance and White fear drive Republican identity more than any other factor — and in turn drive the tribalism and dysfunction in the U.S. political system.

Other factors sped the party’s turn toward nihilism … the ascent of conservative talk radio, followed by the triumph of Fox News, followed by the advent of social media. Combined, they created a media environment that allows Republican politicians and their voters to seal themselves in an echo chamber of “alternative facts.”

But the biggest cause is race. It is crucial to understand that Donald Trump didn’t create this noxious environment. He isn’t some hideous, orange Venus emerging from the half-shell. Rather, he is a brilliant opportunist; he saw the direction the Republican Party was taking and the appetites it was stoking. The onetime pro-choice advocate of universal health care reinvented himself to give Republicans what they wanted. Because Trump is merely a reflection of the sickness in the GOP, the problem won’t go away when he does.

R.I.P. Civil Discourse

Posted on March 4, 2018 by jilldennison under Political commentary, Social commentary

It once was considered good form to engage one’s brain before engaging one’s mouth. This procedure was known as ‘civility’, or ‘civil discourse’, and was once quite popular. It was the thing, perhaps, that kept us from killing each other. It was the thing that kept marriages together, even in times of trouble. Until one day somebody, and I know not who, gave the process a name: political correctness. For some reason, giving it a name made it a process to be shunned, made it unpopular.

The latest evidence of the reversal of civil discourse is a comment I read this morning by republican Senator Orrin Hatch when speaking to a group at the American Enterprise Institute on Thursday:

“[We] finally did away with the individual mandate tax that was established under that wonderful bill called Obamacare. Now, if you didn’t catch on, I was being very sarcastic. That was the stupidest, dumbass bill that I’ve ever seen. Some of you may have loved it. If you do, you are one of the stupidest, dumbass people I’ve ever met. [emphasis added] There are a lot of them up there on Capitol Hill from time to time.”

Hatch later apologized, sort of, for his remarks saying they were ‘flippant’ and ‘off-the-cuff’, though it appeared he was reading from a prepared speech. ‘A poorly-worded joke’, he said. Not to let Senator Hatch off the hook, for he deserves to be called on the carpet for his remarks, but he is only one of many who, seemingly energized by the populist movement in general, and by Donald Trump specifically, have relaxed both their brains and their mouths, and allow whatever thoughts they have to tumble out unfettered.

There are many definitions for ‘civil discourse’:

“Engagement in discourse intended to enhance understanding …”
“The language of dispassionate objectivity”

A June editorial in the Los Angeles Times suggests “Trump didn’t birth American intolerance. He’s the manifestation of our long-disturbed national dialogue.” In response, a reader of the Times wrote …

“When personal computers and the Internet became ubiquitous, civility was dealt a final blow. It’s so easy to be nasty and cruel sitting at a keyboard, never seeing what impact the nastiness and vulgarity are having on the recipients of such missives.”

We could debate … with civility … for days and still not likely pin down an answer about when, how and why we have lost the art of true communication sans rancor, or civil discourse. But the debate is rather pointless, rather like worrying about how the dog got rabies, instead of taking the dog to the vet to be treated for the condition.

We in the U.S. are living in the most divisive, polarized environment since the Civil War era, and the thing that is most lacking is understanding of the other side. Understanding is not going to come to any of us in a nightly dream, nor is it going to suddenly strike us like a streak of lightening. The only path to understanding is going to come through conversation. By conversation, I do not mean the type of communication we see daily on CNN or Fox News, where people are constantly deriding one side or the other, name-calling and using phrases that are designed not to communicate, but to stir anger and resentment. The only thing this type of communication accomplishes is to push the two sides further apart.

Not long ago, I wrote a piece titled Thoughts on Integrity in which I opined that integrity is basically dead in many areas including government, medicine and religion. I would say the same for civility, only I would add that the loss of civility has extended to many other areas, including families, friendships and neighbors.

If we are to make a start at narrowing what I have referred to as The Great Divide in this nation, we are going to have to have a return to civil discourse, a return to kindness, compassion, a return to listening to what another person says rather than listening only with the intention of providing a response. We need to listen to each other … truly listen. Then, before responding, we must think … process what was said, and respond with calmness, not rancor, not vitriol. This is not easy, but I think that the longer we wait to make a start, the harder it gets. I too am guilty of this. Words can hurt, words can anger … we need to choose our words much more carefully. We must learn, once again, to be kind.

I’m not advocating that we have to agree with everything we hear, for we are not lemmings. But there are ways of disagreeing without offending. Our words need not be a personal affront, or target the other person. We can, as one of my friends is fond of saying, respectfully agree to disagree and move on.

But I think the example needs to come from the top. Church leaders need to remove the politics of intolerance and hate from their speech. Politicians, our elected representatives, need to treat us and also each other with respect. For a senator to refer to the people he has been tasked to represent as ‘stupid’ or ‘dumbass’ is simply unacceptable. Every one of his constituents should be writing letters respectfully protesting and reminding him that he faces re-election in a few short months.

The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees a right to freedom of speech, and yes, hate speech is protected as long as it does not incite violence. Whether that should be the case or not is a discussion beyond the scope of this post, but it is up to us to show some common sense, to treat others with respect, to learn to keep our mouths shut sometimes. Just because you can say something, just because the U.S. Constitution gives you the right to say something cruel and senseless, doesn’t necessarily mean you should. It doesn’t necessarily mean it is helpful or will solve any problems.

The leaders of this nation, both in Congress and in the White House, need to first set the tone, need to learn to speak without raised voices, without shaking fists, without name calling. But first, they need to learn to listen. How can they possibly manage the government that is ‘by the people, for the people, and of the people’ if they do not listen to the people, if they do not know the needs of the people, and if they view We the People as ‘stupid dumbasses’?

Is civil discourse dead? Perhaps so. Can it be revived? Surely it can, but it requires the effort of each and every one of us. It requires a commitment to respect the opinions of others, even those we disagree with. And it requires that sometimes we be willing to admit that maybe, just maybe, we were wrong. The ability to say, “I’m sorry”. Think about it.

The Puppeteer

Posted on February 20, 2018 by jilldennison under Global Issues, Political commentary

Disclaimer: The story you are about to read is fiction, a product of the bouncing mind of Filosofa, and to the best of my knowledge, none of the following conversations took place, though similar ones may or may not have.

The exact date is unimportant, but it was sometime around mid-2014, when Russian President Vladimir Putin was enjoying a nice supper with two of his closest advisors. They were discussing Barack Obama and the United States, supposedly an ally, but not acting very much like one, in Putin’s view. Putin: America’s interference in Iraq and Libya have led to regime changes that give our people ideas. I do not like it! The United States needs to stay on its own side of the globe and President Obama needs to tend to his business at home and stop meddling in our business. Imposing sanctions for what he considers to be human rights violations! Pah! Я бы удар его задницу!!!

Advisor #1: Well, Obama has only two more years, and then there will be a new president. I hear that clown that has some television show in America where he goes around firing people and screaming “You’re fired!!!” is thinking about entering the race.

Putin: Really? You mean that … oh, what is his name … Chump?

Advisor #2: I believe it is Trump … Donald Trump.

Putin: Oh yes, that’s it! Both of you, work on a dossier … I want to know everything there is to know about this man, his businesses, his family, his connections, even down to what brand of toilet tissue he buys! I’m getting a seed of an idea … Have that dossier on my desk no later than Monday morning!The following Monday, Putin meets again with his advisors after reading the information they provided earlier that day.

Putin: Excellent information! I just got off the phone with Sergey Kislyak, and he is going to schedule a meeting with this Donald Chump later this week. From what I have read in your reports, the man is not only an egomaniac, but not a very bright one! He spends more time in bankruptcy court than he does managing his businesses, he has had as many failures as successes. He is also a liar and a cheat, according to everyone who has ever done business with him, including his own ex-wife! Perfect … absolutely perfect for what I have in mind!

Advisor #2: And what exactly is it that you have in mind, sir? The man, after all, is a bumbling fool whose own ego matters more to him than anything else.

Putin: Exactly!!! He is as pliable as clay, and his ego is his Achilles heel. My plan, you ask? My plan is to make certain that Donald Trump becomes the next president of the United States!

Advisor #1: Brilliant, Mr. President!

Advisor #2: Brilliant, Mr. President!

Putin: By dangling shiny objects in front of him and at the same time, stroking his massive ego, he will become our puppet. Those sanctions that Obama has imposed will disappear, and Mr. Trump will do our bidding!

Advisor #2: But Mr. President, if you don’t mind my asking, how do you plan to ensure this Mr. Trump is elected? American elections are very democratic.

Putin: The details I will leave to the two of you. You may utilize any staff and any other resources you may need, but it is your job for the next two years to ensure that the election in November 2016 goes to the fool with the bad hair. Once you have carried out your mission, I will be able to control the puppet we have placed in the White House in Washington D.C.

It is now 02 March 2016. A lot has happened in the nine months since Trump announced his candidacy, and Putin is once again having a nice dinner at the famed Mari Vanna restaurant with his two advisors.

Putin: Tonight, we celebrate, yes? Our Chump has taken the bait and I don’t know how you’ve done it, but the fool just won 7 of the 11 states that vote on Super Tuesday! You will see a little something extra in your pay stockings this week!

Advisor #1: Thank you, Mr. President. It hasn’t been easy, for Trump seems to wish to bring about his own downfall on a near-daily basis! He offends literally everyone with his crassness and disrespect for all.

Advisor #2: We have paid agitators at all his rallies, and that has helped, for once they start chanting “Lock her up!”, he re-focuses on his diatribe against Ms. Clinton and we are able to bring him back on track.

Putin: You’ve done well, but the hardest part is still ahead of us, and that is getting enough votes. How is the advertising campaign coming?

Advisor #1: We have set up accounts all over social media, and it is successful beyond our wildest imaginings! People are actually believing nearly everything we tell them! I never knew how pliable, how gullible, the American people are!

Putin: Well you must understand this … they are greedy to a fault. If you tell them that they are so underpaid, that they deserve so much better, and that Trump is the answer, that he will make them wealthy, they will believe it because they want to believe it. They want it to be so. And the hacking of the voting machines?

Advisor #2: That is not coming quite as well, sir. The security is excellent, and of the 21 states whose machines we have attempted to breach, only two have been minimally successful, Illinois and Arizona. We have our best cyber-techs on it, and have even hired assistance from, believe it or not, Silicon Valley! As well, of course, as the Swiss.

Putin: Okay, it is clear that we will not have as much impact as we would like in that area, but don’t give up! We must focus, then, on making sure the people are convinced that Ms. Clinton, whom is actually quite nice, but far too smart, is seen as a criminal with much to hide, and that Mr. Chump, er, Trump, is seen as the one who will make all their dreams come true. Have you been successful in making contact within the Trump camp?

Assistant #1: Yes sir, that has been quite successful, and we are told that Trump’s grown children play a major part in his campaign, and even better, that they are no more intelligent than Trump himself, so we are hoping to soon be able to make direct contact with one or possibly two of them.

Putin: And you have been acquiring the information to use as blackmail if needs be, yes?

Assistant #2: Of course, sir. Once elected, he will do our bidding in the areas that concern us, as we will have him ‘by the short hairs’, as they say in the U.S. In other areas, we will leave him to his own devices.

Putin: Perfect! I am well pleased by your work and I think we will be celebrating on the ninth of November!

There were many more meetings over the course of the next nine months, but let us fast forward to November 9^th, at 9:00 a.m. Moscow time, 1:00 a.m. in Washington D.C. Putin and his advisors are once again meeting, and when the advisors arrive, Putin has a huge bottle of champagne waiting.

Putin: Well, gentlemen, we did it! We have pulled off the biggest heist in the history of mankind! We literally stole an election! There is still much work to be done, however you both must take a vacation for two weeks and recharge, for we now embark on the next phase.

Advisor #1: {groans} Yes sir, thank you very much President Putin.

Advisor #2: {groans} And what, sir, is the next phase, if I am permitted to ask?

Putin: Chaos. We must create so much chaos within the two parties and among the people, in the halls of Congress, that they cannot agree with each other on virtually anything!

Advisor #2: And might I ask the goal of this chaos campaign?

Putin: To keep the people of the United States from coming together, discussing ideas, and perhaps figuring out that Donald Trump is a crass fool who cannot fulfill his promises to them, and had no intention of doing so anyway. It wouldn’t be hard to figure out if they simply stopped screaming at each other and talked, so we must keep the chaos at a high level, keep them biting and snarling at each other, and give the Chump free reign, for he will inadvertently play along with our plan! {sips champagne} And now, gentlemen, I must make some calls, if you will excuse me? Enjoy your vacations!

Sleep well tonight, my friends.

Sunday Morning Musings From The Mind Of Filosofa

Posted on February 11, 2018 by jilldennison under Global Issues, Political commentary, Racism & Bigotry, Social commentary

I wonder why the phrase ‘den of iniquity’ keeps coming to mind when I think of the White House these days? Could it be because it seems that everyone who works or resides there has some form of sexual perversion in their past, and maybe even in their present? And yet, those evangelical Christians, the very same ones who are dead set against a woman’s right to choose whether to have a child or not, the ones who would smite those who love a person of their own gender … those very same people are applauding the perverts who have taken over the White House and are turning it into a cesspool. Think about that one for a few minutes.

Thinking that surely Trump’s approval rating must have dipped after this week, his defense of his aides who were found to have abused their wives, his rants and tirades, not to mention the instability of the stock market, I headed over to FiveThirtyEight to check the aggregation of polls. Imagine my shock when I see that his average approval rating is actually up from about 38% a week ago to 40.8% this weened. Somebody needs to find that big stash of Kool-Aid and destroy it! So much for my good humour.The pseudo-drama of a government shutdown every month is getting old, people. It has become a tool of manipulation between Trump, the republicans in Congress, and the democrats in Congress. It is a game for them, and we are quickly becoming immune to the drama, shrugging our shoulders and saying, “whatever”. The last one lasted five hours and those were while we were sleeping, so nobody really noticed. If most of us did our jobs as poorly as members of Congress and the ‘man’ in the Oval Office do, we would be fired. A government shut-down is not a toy to play with. We truly must be the laughingstock of the world.Trump got part of his wish, an additional $500 billion in military spending, about which he tweeted …

“Just signed Bill. Our Military will now be stronger than ever before. We love and need our Military and gave them everything — and more. First time this has happened in a long time. Also means JOBS, JOBS, JOBS!” – 8:39 AM – Feb 9, 2018

With unemployment at only 4.1%, and some portion of those being people who either cannot work, or have retired, and with the plan to deport a portion of the work force soon, I’m not sure who will take all those “JOBS”. And, I have no idea why we needed to increase military spending while allowing people in this country to go without affordable healthcare. Perhaps some republican can explain this to me?Why does it have to be ‘them’ vs ‘us’? Is not the purpose of every government to see to the best interests of the nation as a whole, and its people? Why is compromise so very difficult for those we hired to do this job? Perhaps it is because we are not holding them accountable for doing their job, but instead are cheering and applauding their grandstanding, their showmanship. The ‘Great Divide’ is only worsening, and as I predicted two years ago, the chasm is so wide now that the people of this country may never again be unified. The name of this nation, the United States of America, is truly a misnomer these days, for there is nothing united about us.Does anybody in the U.S. know or care about the water crisis in Cape Town, South Africa? As of February 1^st, new water restrictions limit households to 13 gallons of water per person per day, and even at that, they are likely to be further reduced. In fact, people in Cape Town are anticipating ‘Day Zero’, when the government will turn off the taps to homes and businesses to ensure that hospitals have water. Residents will then be issued 6.6 gallons at communal water distribution points. I can and likely will write a post about this grim situation, but for this morning, suffice it to say that I am disturbed that there is little, if any, concern among the people of the U.S. over the water crisis in Cape Town. First of all, the people affected are our brothers and sisters, a part of the human race, so how can we not care? And second, as a result of climate change, this situation is going to spread and even the U.S. at some point will begin to face water shortages. Take the blinders off and stop drinking the Kool-Aid, folks … climate change is real, is being exacerbated by humans, and has very real-world consequences.The 2018 Olympic Winter Games have begun in Pyeongchang. Typically, the winter Olympics excite me, though I am not a sports enthusiast, but this year I am decidedly ‘meh’ and have not even tuned in yet. Why? Partly because I am a glum person these days, but also because the U.S. has succeeded in putting politics over teamwork, over sportsmanship. The U.S. is not capable of setting aside differences for a few days in order to support young athletes from all over the world who have worked so hard to get to the Olympics, to realize their dreams. On Friday, at the opening ceremonies, Mike Pence refused to stand for any country except the U.S. In a historic moment, North and South Korea joined together, putting differences aside for this moment, and marched under a common flag in the opening ceremonies. The moment was emotional and was greeted with great enthusiasm and a standing ovation. By all except Mike Pence and his wife. They alone remained stony-faced and seated. What a message we are sending the world, eh?

Clive Bundy and his sons are out of prison and back on the streets, and nothing has changed. They are planning more mayhem in the near future, and ol’ Clive is already encouraging his fellow ranchers and other followers to disregard any laws they don’t agree with. Stay tuned for more on the Bundy clan who are apparently stuck in the days of the old West and haven’t yet entered the 21^st century, nor even the 20^th.And finally, here’s something to make you shake your head and say, wtf??? I was Googling for a website that a friend had asked me to check out, and I accidentally happened on this pen …The price? Hold on to your jaw .. $17,800.00! GULP. And they don’t even offer free shipping!

Filosofa's Word

Cogito Ergo Sum

Tag Archives: political polarization

The Puppeteer