A Call to Arms: Inciting Violence

American Fascism, Death of Democracy, Death of Truth, Decline of the west, Trump

 

I prepared this post last night (January 5, 2021) in anticipation of the Joint meeting of the 2 houses of the US Congress and Trump’s comments I heard on the television):

 

Trump appeared at a rally in Georgia on January 4, 2021 ostensibly to support 2 Republican candidates for the US Senate, but, of course, he could not hold back on efforts to promote his own special cause of overcoming his defeat in the election in November. In fact Trump went so far it seemed like he was inciting his supporters to get violent to support him. At least it certainly could be characterized that way.

Here is what Amy Davidson Sorokin said in an article in the New Yorker,

“Trump is not fighting for his legacy but to unconstitutionally and criminally hold on to a position that he has already lost. In typical Trump style, he is doing so, in part, by calling his opponents the real crooks: “The Democrats are trying to steal the White House—you cannot let them!” he said in Dalton.

But what does that injunction mean for Trump supporters who are not elected officials or judges? What plate does Trump expect them to step up to? He wanted them to vote for Perdue and Loeffler, but that wouldn’t be enough. In the course of the rally, he warned that if “we don’t do something fast,” there will never be another free election and the United States will succumb to “communism.” “If you don’t fight to save your country with everything you have, you’re not gonna have a country left,” he said. He appeared to be past caring whether anyone listening heard that as a call to violence. The system is corrupt, he said, it is rigged, his supporters have a mission. “We have to go all the way, and that’s what’s happening,” Trump said. “You watch what happens over the next couple of weeks, you watch what’s going to come out, watch what’s going to be revealed.” The crowd cheered, and did so again a moment later when he said, “They’re not taking this White House; we’re going to fight like hell.” What else did they need to hear?”

 

To people who love their country and hate communism with passion, this is a call to save the country from people who are trying to steal it. Would such people, if properly coached not be willing to join a war to defend it? Is this not a call to war?

A Bully against a Brave Defender of Truth

American Fascism, Death of Democracy, Decline of the west, Trump

 

By now everyone has likely heard about the hour long phone call between Donald Trump, his chief of Staff Mark Meadows, a bunch of his lawyers, and Brad Ratffensperger, Georgia’s secretary of state together with his General Counsel.   I listened to most of the telephone call and it really did sound as Michael Bromwich, a former inspector general at the Justice Department,  described it commented on Twitter as reported by John Cassidy in the New Yorker,

“The entire call is astonishing, the bullying, the threats, the insults, the credulous embrace of discredited conspiracy theories. Like a crime boss, Trump occasionally says that all he wants is the truth. But he doesn’t—he wants the win.”

Trump wanted Raffensperger to kick the election his way. Simple. Find the votes—somewhere. So Trump leaned on Raffensperger.

President Trump rambled on for many minutes, as he tends to do, urging Raffensperger the Republican Secretary of State, whose job it was to certify the election results in Georgia, a state that Trump narrowly lost by to find the 11,780 votes he needed to overturn Biden who beat him by a measly 11,779 votes. Trump and his allies were trying to get the Secretary of State to override the will of the voters of Georgia in his favour based on dubious discredited claims of various irregularities.

As Cassidy reported,

“Raffensperger and his general counsel, who was also on the call, calmly pointed out that his office had investigated all of these claims and found them to be false. (Georgia’s state supreme court and a federal judge appointed by George W. Bush rejected the Trump campaign’s claims as well.)”

Raffefsperger quietly  and repeatedly told the president he was not telling the truth and the truth would come out. The “facts” Trump was relying on where not true. But Trump was not deterred by the truth coming out. He never is. It doesn’t even phase him. Instead he reverted to bullying. Again a typical Trump response.

Trump responded like a true wanna-be despot: Trump wasn’t to be put off. “So what are we going to do here, folks? I only need eleven thousand votes,” he repeated. “Fellas, I need eleven thousand votes. Give me a break.” Find me the votes.it didn’t matter where. Raffensperger could admit he made a mistake or whatever. It didn’t matter how he explained it. What mattered was that he found 11,800 votes. The crime boss was pleading. But, he did not stop there. He strongly suggested to the Secretary of State that the people of Georgia would be angry with him and the act of refusing to do what Trump asked for was illegal and he and his General Counsel could get in trouble for that. Nothing like a little muscle when asking nicely doesn’t work.

Yet bravely, Republican Brad Raffensperger stood up to the President of the United States to uphold the truth. Americans should be proud, but there are still a lot of people who support Trump in his efforts to defeat the will of the majority of the people of Georgia. That is the real issue here.

To say that Trump is a wanna-be autocrat is not interesting any more. It is too well known. What is scary is that so many Republicans agree with this. So far more than 100 Congressmen and 11 Senators have said they will support Trump in his plan to overturn the election on January 6, 2020 when the two houses of the American Congress will be asked to ratify the electoral college vote. Normally that is a mere formality. Not this time. Vice-president Mike Pence will be presiding. Ominously this is what Pence has already said, as reported by John Cassidy:

“Soon after this news emerged, Vice-President Mike Pence, a politician who gives invertebrates a bad name, issued a statement saying that he “welcomes the efforts of members of the House and Senate to use the authority they have under the law to raise objections and bring forward evidence before the Congress and the American people on January 6th.”

It could be very interesting to see how far down the slope to fascism the Republican Party will go on January 6, 2020. Keep watch. We should all do that. Who said the price of liberty is eternal vigilance?

Clean Air

Environment, Social democracy, The Commons

 

When we were in Paris a couple of years ago we noticed that there were places in the city where the government had provided electrical sites to charge their electric cars. Manitoba does this as well but to a very limited extent. In discussions with an American he asked me, “why should the government pay for that? ”Why should I have to pay for someone else to charge his car?” I would say in response that we should all pay for that because we all want a clean environment. Clean air is a public good and we should all pay for it. Besides, the government spends billions (many billions) subsidizing the fossil fuel industry. Surely it can spend a little to subsidize cars that don’t pollute the air and don’t increase our greenhouse gas emissions. Though I recognize that electric cars are not all good either. Life is rarely that simple. We all have to realize that there are many public goods that are important to a good life on this planet. We must all pay for those. The French have learned this. Canadians and Americans not so much.

One good thing about the Covid-19 pandemic is that we are starting to appreciate (not nearly enough of course) that the common good is important. Often more important than private goods, no matter what those who hoard the private goods tell us. It’s time to start thinking for ourselves.

Bombshell

Human rights, Movies, Sexual harassment/Assault

 

 

This was a film released in 2019. It stars 3 outstanding female actresses in 3 outstanding roles. In this film the men are the sidebars. The women are the film. Charlize Theron plays Megyn Kelly, Nicole Kidman as Gretchen Carlson, and Margot Robbie as Kayla Pospisil. The women were all women television personalities at Fox News involved in the claims of sexual harassment against the CEO of Fox Roger Ailes. I actually don’t know the true story of the events so can’t complain about the truth or accuracy of the film’s version of events. That is good, because then I am free to say, the story is true. It is true in the same sense that Macbeth is true. That is what counts.

I was particularly engrossed by the role of Kayla Pospisil. She wanted to be a star on Fox like Megyn and Gretchen She is a true child of Fox. For her and her family is Fox is their religion.  Kayla, played by Margot Robbie,  boldly said, “I don’t want to be on TV, I want to be on Fox. My family, everyday, especially holidays is Fox News. Fox News is how we go to Church.” This nicely captured the theological devotion to Fox. That is what Fox is all about.

Trying to get a spot on Fox News, preferably a show like Kelly or Carlson you see how she would do anything to get on the show no matter how degrading and she gets the opportunity to do exactly that. She gets solid advice from her friend a secret lesbian, and horrors, someone who doesn’t automatically hate liberals. Fox is not the place for her to be. But the friend gives her this advice:

“You have to adopt the attitude of an Irish street cop. The world is a bad place. People are lazy morons. Minorities are criminals. Sex is sick, but interesting. Ask yourself what will scare my grand mother, or piss off my grand father, and that’s a Fox story. Frighten. Titillate. Frighten. Titillate. Frighten. Titillate. When you start a story you need to start with a clear villain: Liberal judge, Vermont, Hollywood. Conservatives want to conserve. You are the last defence against Jesus hating, trans loving, Clinton controlled Armageddon.”

That is Fox News! Particularly the commentators like Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity.  Again from my experience, even though I admit I have not watched Fox often, except for excerpts on Comedy News,  that must be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. This felt true. Of course, that is a poor way to judge truth.

The men on the show are largely rogues. Again this just has to be true. As is said of Bill O’Reilly: “He cannot scale his anger. He is a perpetual anger machine. That’s why the crazies love him.” When he appears on television, and I think this was a “real” clip he said,

“In this country every famous or wealthy man is a target. You’re a target. I’m a target. Any time someone could come out and sue us, attack us, or get the press, and that’s a deplorable situation.”

That’s the whimpering cry of rich and powerful men. We should feel sorry for them. They are the ones that are oppressed.

The women who want a job must pass the Roger Ailes test. They must give a spin in a circle in front of this powerful  sleazy old man to demonstrate they have the body for the job. This certainly must be true. Ailes tells Pospisil:

“This is the most competitive industry on earth. I could pluck you out of a line and move you to the front. But you have to give me one thing. Do you know what it is? (He pauses for a long time) Loyalty (like his hero Trump and with just as much grace.) You have to prove you are loyal. And you must find a way to prove it. That’s about it and we’ll talk again”.

The message is clear enough. Pospisil knows what she must do. Will she do it? If she does it or not she will pay a price either way. A big price.

The movie is about women standing up (or not) to powerful men. No let me rephrase that. This is the story about people standing up to powerful people. People who can oppress you and make you pay a big price. You are damned if you do, and damned if you don’t. It takes great courage to stand up and those who do, rarely “win”. Even when they “win” they lose. That makes it a universal story. That’s why it’s a true story. No matter what the facts.

I don’t want to give away the truth of the film, but I want to point out 2 facts with which the film closes.

Fox paid $50 million dollars to 2 women who alleged sexual harassment which its 2 male stars denied. And it also paid $65 million to the two male stars it said it had “just cause” to fire The two women who risked their careers to make the claim and were among the first to bring down 2 powerful public male television news stars, but they were not the last. And they were paid less than the male alleged harasser. What kind of “victory” is that? Reminds me of the fact that after the Civil War the United States paid reparations after the slaves were freed because of centuries of enslavement. The reparations were paid to southern plantation owners who lost their property!

At least one of the women had to sign a non-disclosure agreement. Darn I hate those and the lawyers who get away with demanding them.

This was an excellent film with a lot of truth. Ugly truth.

 

 

You will never catch up with Injustice

Epidemics/Pandemics, Social Justice

 

William Faulkner once said ‘you will never catch up with injustice.’ Truer words have never been spoken.

 Kyle Hiebert had some important things to say in a recent opinion piece in the Winnipeg Free Press. Here is the opening paragraph of that piece:

“With numerous national COVID-19 vaccine programs underway, the world has potentially entered the final chapter of the pandemic. That is, however, if you are lucky enough to be living in a country that has access to a vaccine. For billions of people around the world, that is not the reality.”

 

In the west we worry that our political leaders have not scrambled hard enough, quickly enough, and with enough ferocity to get our “fair share” of the vaccines. Of course in each country or each jurisdiction “fair share” means gross excess. No one is satisfied with fair. This attitude is spreading around the world like a pandemic. Funny how that happens.

Africa has been warned that they may not see the vaccines until the latter part of 2021.  According to Hiebert, here is the harsh reality and we should look at it, even though we may hate to do that:

“…advocacy groups warned that in more than 60 of the world’s poorest nations, nine in 10 people will be denied a vaccine before 2022. Other assessments say the wait could be as long as until 2024. Instead, wealthy nations representing a mere 14 per cent of the world’s population have snatched up billions of doses of different vaccines through pre-purchase agreements with a range of manufacturers, accumulating stockpiles grossly disproportionate to their population size.”

 

As has been happening over and over again during this pandemic we are seeing the existing inequities in our societies repeatedly exposed if not magnified. What shocked me though is which country is the worst offender? USA? Russia? Turkey? No. Canada!

As Hiebert said,

“The world’s worst offender: Canada, which — while failing at developing its own domestic vaccine production capacity — pre-purchased enough jabs to inoculate its population five times over. The Trudeau government has now belatedly announced that Canada would donate $485 million to COVID- 19 mitigation efforts in developing countries.”

 

Now in fairness to Canada, our federal government took the initiative and risk and ordered vaccines from a number of corporations on speculation hoping that some would work out well, but expecting that not all would work out at all. It spent a lot of money contractually agreeing to buy vaccines that might have turned out to be worthless. It did that to protect Canada who lacks the capacity to produce its own vaccines. We Canadians are likely happy they did that. But now—perhaps—we have too much. I hope we do the right thing now and help less advantaged countries get their fair share too.

Countries like Canada must do their part to bring about justice. Attitudes of Canada First or America First have their dark sides that ought not to be ignored and should be limited. We have to remember that we actually are in this together. Until the poorest country tackles this disease it can come back to haunt those countries that thought they survived the worst. As well, all world economies now rely on international trade and if poor countries suffer they won’t be able to buy good from rich countries and as a result all economies will suffer.

Kyle Hiebert summed the issues up well this way:

“The end of the pandemic may be within sight — for some. But even in the post-pandemic era, the myopic outlook of rich countries in terms of security and prosperity will continue to threaten the world’s ability to become a safer, more equal and more sustainable place.”

May be then we can at least see injustice and do something about it, even if we can’t run it down.

Is it really the fault of the homeless?

Decline of the west, Epidemics/Pandemics, Social democracy

 

Manitoba has the second highest rate of deaths from Covid-19 iun Canada. Only Quebec has more.

Recently, I heard Manitoba health officials said the reason Manitoba was in such poor shape during this pandemic was because Manitoba had so many homeless and poor people. I believe that is true. But is it really the fault of homeless and poor people? That  begs the real question—why does Manitoba have so many poor people? And why have Manitobans not cared about them? At least until now.

Now some people are starting to realize that during a crisis we are only as strong as our weakest members. Inequality in other words is dangerous. I wish more people learned this valuable lesson. Reducing inequality is good for all of us. It is not just poor people who benefit from such measures—we all do.

 

Economic Nonsense

Epidemics/Pandemics, Social democracy, Social Justice

 

There is one person in our family—and only one—that as soon as she is required to go for a Covid-19 test, she will get it immediately. She moves to the head of the line. And she gets her results the same day. She gets that benefit because she is important. The work she does is important. She is a care worker in a long-term private care facility for mentally challenged adult men. I agree with that. This is important work. If no one is on the job these men can’t survive. If she is not on the job it is not that easy to get a replacement.  Who wants to do such work? Who wants to change the diapers of adult men? Who wants to work shifts often through the night for low wages? I believe she also has the longest seniority of anyone in our family. She has worked there for many years.

Yet—and this is the interesting part—she is nowhere near the highest earner in our family. Rather she is woefully under paid. This is totally unfair. Our health care system recognizes her importance. Our economic system does not. That is also woeful. We bad. This is nonsense!

 

A Hanukah gift for Jared: A Pardon for Papa

Corruption, Decline of the west, Trump

Recently, on a pardon spree Trump pardoned Charles Kushner, the father of his son-in-law, Jared.

Chris Christie former Republican governor of New Jersey and before that a federal prosecutor who prosecuted Kushner said this,

“I thought it was so obvious that he had to be prosecuted. If a guy hires a prostitute to seduce his brother-in-law and video tapes it, and then sends video tapes to his sister to attempt to intimidate her from testifying in front of a grand jury, do I really need any more justification than that? I just laid out the facts and anyone confronted with he facts knows I had a moral and ethical duty to bring that prosecution.”

Christie said Kushner was “loathsome” and disgusting. In fact he reminded us that as a prosecutor in New Jersey he saw some pretty loathsome cases, but this one was the worst. We should remember too that Charles Kushner was no innocent. He pleaded guilty. Something rich white men rarely need to do. But, Jared calls him Dad. And Trump implicitly said, “he’s good enough for me. My kind of guy.”