Wednesday, January 31, 2018

Outlawing history

Poland is another of those countries like the U.S. where nationalist racists are doing quite well in the government.  Now the parliament, controlled by the nationalists, has a draft bill to penalize any mention of Polish complicity by either the Polish state or Poles in the killing of Jews during 
World War II.  

Almost half of the Jews killed in the Holocaust were Polish Jews.  Many Poles did their best to aid their fellow Jewish citizens, but it is also true that anti-Semitism is a deep thread in Polish history, and many Poles were complicit.  


The bill would punish anyone who admits that with a fine and up to three years in prison.  Once again we see a nation trying desperately to re-write history.  We’re pretty familiar with that.

Tuesday, January 30, 2018

Trump's speech

My Mother had an expression for musicians and politicians she didn’t care for that went, “I wouldn’t walk out to the barn to see [insert name here.]  She really disliked Frank Sinatra.  More than once I heard, “I wouldn’t walk out to the barn to see Frank Sinatra.”


The barn was torn down in 1969; Mother died in 1993, but I thought of her tonight when I realized, “I wouldn’t walk to the living room to hear Donald Trump.”  I’m also pretty certain that liberal Democratic committeewoman and feminist Ellen Christman wouldn’t have either.

Monday, January 29, 2018

The Rohingya

The Rohingya are a community of about a million Muslims in the northern part of the Myanmar state of Rakhine.  (You may know Myanmar as Burma.)  Under the laws for Myanmar, they are not considered citizens and they are not allowed to vote.

They are considered aliens.

Now they are being driven out of Myanmar, and hundreds of thousands are refugees in Bangladesh.  Myanmar feels no compassion; after all, the Rohingya are not citizens.  Why should they be allowed to stay?  


We look at this and think, how terrible it is that a country would deliberately create refugees by the hundreds of thousands.

Sunday, January 28, 2018

Out of Control

The most important election in American history was in 1800, when the Federalist John Adams turned over the government to his hated opponent Thomas Jefferson.  The transition was peaceful.  Adams made no attempt to use the army against Jefferson; Jefferson did not arrest Adams after he took power.

Democracy depends on a willingness of opponents to see each other as opponents, not enemies.  This was one of Nixon’s great failings; he actually had an “enemies list.”

In the last few years we have been losing our culture of democracy.  When President Obama nominated Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court, the Senate refused to even consider him, although Garland was a moderate and the Republicans were overturning 150 years of tradition.  When President Trump nominated Mr. Gorsuch, an extreme rightist, the Republicans gleefully approved him with almost no Democratic support.  Now there is talk that if the Democrats capture control of the Senate, they will not approve any Trump nominee for the Court.

This kind of polarization is getting worse and worse.  You can see it in my posts.  I not only dislike this President, I loathe him, think he should be impeached, think he is unfit.  His NRA and neo-Nazi backers, I am sure, probably think of me as someone who should be deported, or worse.


Where will it end?  I don’t know, but I don’t have much hope for the future.  Sure, the stock market is up.  But international violence is increasing, global warming is getting worse, democracy is under attack in India, Israel, Poland, Turkey, Russia, Czechoslovakia, and, yes, the United States.  

Saturday, January 27, 2018

Aiding coal in Vietnam

Vietnam is planning to build a coal-fired electrical plant that will put an estimated 5.4 million tons of carbon dioxide in the air annually.  The World Bank is dubious about aiding coal-fired plants and seems unlikely to help fund this project.

Now the American Export-Import Bank may step in and assume the risk for the Vietnamese plant with U.S. taxpayer money.


This is nuts.  The coal used will not be U.S. coal.  It will be imported from countries closer to Vietnam.  Is Trump so enamored with digging coal and wrecking the future of the globe that he is willing to back coal-fired power generation in Vietnam?  What is wrong with this man?

Friday, January 26, 2018

I got mine, screw you

During the mid-70s San Jose was the destination for thousands of Vietnamese refugees who had fled the Communist government.  During that time I was a field rep for a state senator, and our office had to respond to some very nasty letters and calls attacking the new immigrants.  Some of the most racist claimed our new residents were eating cats and dogs, and California actually passed a bill forbidding the eating of pets.

Today I read an article that many immigrants to the United States, including some Vietnamese, are opposing legislation to allow Dreamers to stay.  They complain that they had to come here legally, so why shouldn’t these kids be allowed to stay?  

First, maybe because the Dreamers were brought here as kids.  Secondly, I have never understood the motivations of people who think “I suffered and had a terrible time, so I want you to suffer and have a terrible time as well.”  I don’t get that.

I also don’t understand people like Lou Barletta, descendent of immigrants who arrived before the U.S. had quotas and restrictions, now calling for quotas and restrictions.

Nor do I understand the anti-abortion letter writer to the Morning Call today attacking people who wanted to allow the Dreamers to stay and tied that to a lack of concern for the “unborn.”


Luckily the cruel, the mean, and the stupid are in the minority. 

Thursday, January 25, 2018

Just another school shooting

They’ve become routine.  In Kentucky a 15-year-old boy shot a dozen classmates earlier this week, killing two of them.  According to the New York Times, this was the 11th school shooting of the year.  That’s 11 in 23 days, almost one every two days on average.

CNN gave the shooting in Kentucky 10 minutes, 2 seconds.  Fox gave it 5 minutes.  MSNBC gave it 1 minute, 1 second.  


Perhaps we would care more about these shootings if they were actually covered.  It isn’t that we are getting “fake news.”  The problem is that we aren’t getting anything but repetition about tweets and Mueller and the shutdown, and almost nothing about Kurds or Palestinians, trade wars, environmental degradation, and about 50 other issues I could mention.

Wednesday, January 24, 2018

Solar panels on our shed roof


I am so glad we bought our solar panels during the Obama administration.  The Trump administration seems determined not only to deny global warming, but also to accelerate it.  Trump has now put heavy tariffs on imported solar panels (ours were made in South Korea), which will raise the price considerably, thereby increasing the attractiveness of coal and oil and fracking gas as energy producers.

Analysts think that Individuals like me will probably continue to install solar panels even if they cost more.  The tariff will mostly affect large utilities that are building vast arrays of solar power generators.  Since far more people work in the solar industry than work in the coal industry, this will have a negative effect on the economy.  

MAGA?


The generosity of American corporations

You’ve probably heard how generous Walmart has been with its tax cut, raising the minimum wage it pays workers and giving them a bonus, thanks to Trump’s wonderful tax cut.  The wage raise cost the company $300 million.  The bonuses cost about $400 million.  Walmart plans to use the rest of its tax cut to buy back company-issued debt.  That will cost much of the rest of its tax cut–about $4 BILLION.

Apple’s bonuses will cost about $300 million.  Its savings from just one provision in the law will net it $40 BILLION.  

Barely one in five companies will give any of their windfall to workers.  Trump has gotten some great P.R. out of the few bonuses, but the workforce has basically gotten bupkis.


Information for this post was taken from “Tax-Law Bonuses Veil a Bonanza for Companies” by Jim Tankersley, New York Times, (Jan. 23, 2018), pp. 1, 13.

Monday, January 22, 2018

Say goodbye to Goofy kicking Donald Duck

Today the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that the way Congressional districts were gerrymandered violated the state’s constitution.  The most egregious district has been called “Goofy kicking Donald Duck,” and if you go to <https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/name-that-district-contest-winner-goofy-kicking-donald-duck/2011/12/29/gIQA2Fa2OP_blog.html?utm_term=.99cd3fef67a4> you’ll see the resemblance.  (If you can’t open it, just search for “Goofy kicking Donald Duck.”)

Not only are the lines unconstitutional, but the districts must be redrawn before the primary election, and if the legislature won’t do it, the Court will.

Now we need to work on the state legislative districts.


On another and completely unrelated note that is just too good to pass up, porn star Stormy Daniels, who received a $130,000 payoff to keep secret a sexual liaison with Trump months after Melania gave birth to Trump’s son, has now embarked on a nationwide tour entitled MAHA, or Make America Horny Again.  

Sunday, January 21, 2018

One year into the decline of America

Today in a report in the Morning Call Trump supporters were interviewed for their opinions on one-year of Making America Great Again.  And once again, they mentioned the stock market, how Trump speaks his mind, the tax “reform,” the appointment of the far-right Gorsuch, the ending of protections (which they call regulations), and standing up to North Korea.  

Every one of those items is either questionable or ludicrous.  

And once again they don’t mention global climate change, the refusal to take refugees, the decline of American prestige abroad, the kleptocracy that has replaced our democratic government, and the general lack of any coherent policy either at home or abroad.  


And nobody ever mentions Trump’s pay off to the porn actress.  

Saturday, January 20, 2018

Heffley goes after wind turbines

Good ole Doyle Heffley.  He has introduced an amendment to require a referendum on wind turbines in Penn Forest Township.  The PennEast pipeline, which will cross Penn Forest Township, increase air pollution at the Kidder Township compressor station, cut a swath though Hickory Run State Park, and always have the possibility of an explosion–no referendum needed.  

Fracking?  No referendum needed.


Would it be crass of me to mention campaign contributions from gas and oil companies, but not from wind turbine companies? 

Friday, January 19, 2018

Reply to letters by Trump voters

Yesterday the New York Times ran 15 letters from Trump voters who still support him.  I commented on the letters in the previous post.


Today the Times ran some letters from readers in response.  The funniest one was very short:  “Please don’t do that again.”

Thursday, January 18, 2018

Letters from the "basket of deplorables"

Ok, I know Clinton shouldn’t have said that, and I know I should be reaching out, but I find it so hard.  So hard.

Today the New York Times printed 15 letters from Trump voters who still think highly of the man.  They credit him with defeating ISIS, a roaring stock market, lower unemployment, getting rid of Obamacare, tax “reform” (my quotes, not theirs), authenticity (I guess because he uses vulgar language), working to stop immigration, supporting education rather than teachers’ unions, and the appointment of Neil Gorsuch and other conservative judges.

In the 15 letters there was no mention of voter suppression, Bears Ears, the rollback of environmental protections, the Paris Climate accord, the racism, the weakening of consumer protections, the attempt to subsidize coal at the expense of solar, the off-shore drilling, the declining prestige of America abroad, the attack on the press (except in three cases to support it), the destruction of the norms of civility, the demonizing of opponents, the increase in the national deficit, the personal enrichment of friends and family, the approval of lead shot, the denigration of American Indians, the support of white supremacists, the anti-choice policies, the backing of a sexual predator running for U.S. Senate, and I could go on, but why bother.  


I just can’t stop thinking these voters are either stupid, not paying any attention, getting their information exclusively from Fox, or simply evil.

Wednesday, January 17, 2018

"Good Will Humping"


That was the film Stephanie Clifford, aka “Stormy Daniels,” appeared in before her hanky-panky with Trump.  (Don’t you love the expression “hanky-panky”?)

The Wall Street Journal said that just one month before the election, Trump’s lawyer made a $130,000 payout to Ms. Clifford to shut her mouth.

Then the Daily Beast reported that another porn actress, Jessica Drake, who had accused Trump of offering her $10,000 for sex, signed a non-disclosure agreement barring her from talking about her contact.

Remember when President Clinton had what was referred to as ‘bimbo eruptions”?  Women would accuse him of “misbehaving,” and he would make arrangements to quiet them down.  Republicans had a field day; now they are strangely silent.

One good thing to come out of the first year of the “Trump era” is that Republicans who defend the pussy-grabbing, invective-spewing, porn star groupie will no longer be able to take the “holier than thou” moral high ground.  And Evangelicals, who defended the pedophile Roy Moore, are exposed as true hypocrites.  It’s kind of refreshing.  


Now I’m going on-line to rent “Good Will Humping.”

Tuesday, January 16, 2018

7-11 clerks a threat to America?

Immigration officials raided scores of 7-11 stores this week to root out undocumented workers.  They found a few.  We can all go to bed feeling so much safer because some clerk at the local 7-11, who held a job and paid into Social Security which he will never collect, will be ripped from his home and family and thrown out of the United States.  

Monday, January 15, 2018

Is Trump a racist?

I was tempted to just write yes and end the post, but let me address this in more detail.

One of the reasons I find it difficult to be civil with Trump supporters is that I knew the answer to this question long before the election in 2016.  The whole “birther” business was racist.  Comments made about Mexicans months before the election were racist.  Policies at Trump’s casinos and Trump’s rental properties were racist.  People who voted for him had to either know this or had to dismiss it as unimportant. 


There is nothing Trump has done since his election to make me change my mind.  He has reinforced what I already knew.  The man is racist to his core.  As Martin Luther King taught, there is always room for redemption, of course, but I don’t see that happening.

Sunday, January 14, 2018

Weekend grab bag


According to the latest issue of the Sierra Club magazine, fewer people are struck by lightning than in the past.  The reason:  fewer people go outside.

One of the most exciting finishes I have ever seen in a football game was in the last quarter of the Vikings-Saints playoff this evening.  I only watched the 4th quarter, but that was an amazing quarter.  

The Times today had a chart of the decline in support for Trump among 66 different groups, such as unemployed workers, Westerners, people aged 18-29, Jews, rural adults, and so on.  Not a single group increased in support for Trump, but 12 groups were still above 50% in support.  Want to know what they are?  Of course you do.  

They are:  Evangelicals (WWJD?), military households (this is scary), Republican women (no pride, sad), Protestants (again, WWJD), Republicans (over 80%, no patriotism there), Support Tea Party (expected), Conservatives (really?) Top issue Security (Yeah, we are a LOT safer), Republican men (slightly more than Republican women), Voted Romney in 12 (but evidently not Romney himself); voted 3rd party in 12 (I sure hope none of those are Green or Libertarian), and voted for Trump in 16 (the most supportive group; they are also known as people who drank the Koolaid).  

If you want to forget all of this, go see “Paddington Bear 2.”  It is a wonderful–movie-funny, heartwarming, with a good message.  Take your kids or grandkids.


Saturday, January 13, 2018

Family farms during the Trump era

Last week Trump addressed a convention of the American Farm Bureau Federation.  He touted his tax plan as helping family farmers, and he once again explained how the estate tax repeal would allow farms to be passed to the next generation. 

Trump is a lying sack of horse fertilizer.  He continues to either exaggerate or lie outright.  Some things you should know:

The American Farm Bureau Federation is an organization of corporate farms and large agribusiness units.  It is not an organization of family farmers or part-time farmers.

Most of the tax cut benefits will go to the very top tier of Americans.  The average farmer will get little or nothing.

Farm workers will get zip.  Many will be deported.

Approximately 80 agricultural enterprises would have fallen under the existing estate tax.  As you can imagine, those are huge entities of the very rich.

Trump may speak for wealthy agribusiness, but he does not speak for the vast majority of farmers.  Few farmers are in it for the money.  If they were, they would have quit farming long ago.  They are in it because they love the land, love to grow things, love to produce food from seeds and water and soil and sweat.


A man who never even had a garden, never grew a goddam thing, should not be taking about farming.  

Friday, January 12, 2018

"The Post"

See it.  Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks are excellent, the film is exciting, but most importantly, the movie is a lesson in First Amendment freedoms and the need for an independent press to safeguard our liberties.  That’s a lesson we need to learn again.

What bothered me at the time of the Pentagon Papers case that still upsets me is that the Supreme Court decision upholding press freedom came on a 6-3 vote.  Three Supreme Court justices were willing to curtail the First Amendment.


We now have a president who also doesn’t understand the Bill of Rights.  Unfortunately, we also have a major portion of the media (think Fox News) a Congress (think McConnell and Ryan and their ilk), and a Supreme Court (dominated by the extreme right) that seem either unwilling or unable to put brakes on presidential behavior.  

Thursday, January 11, 2018

Coal companies keep trying

In a previous post I noted that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission had shot down Energy Secretary Ricky Perry’s proposal to subsidize coal and nuclear power plants.  Now Murray Energy Corporation’s CEO is giving his approval to a plan to aid all power plants in the grid that includes Pennsylvania and Ohio.  

The proposal is amazingly complicated (see Tim Loh and Catherine Traywick of Bloomberg News, reported in today’s Morning Call, p. 13), but the bottom line is that coal and nuclear plants within the grid will get more funding, subsidized by the rate payers.  

What really caught my eye, however, was the description of CEO Murray as a “coal miner.”  Linda and I visited the Anthracite Heritage Museum in Scranton today.  I can tell you that Mr. Murray may be lots of things, but he is no coal miner.  


Wednesday, January 10, 2018

FERC says no to the coal industry

Regular readers of this blog know that I generally have little good to say about the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, a regulatory agency that seemingly has never met a pipeline it didn’t like.

Now I must report the amazing news that all five-members of FERC unanimously rejected a proposal by Energy Secretary Rick Perry to subsidize coal and nuclear plants.

Perry argued that renewable power was destabilizing the nation’s power grid.  Interestingly, the nuclear and coal executives, who favor free enterprise capitalism except when they don’t, were asking for government help.

FERC said there was no evidence to support Perry’s claim.


See Evan Halper, “Regulators snub Trump coal, nuclear power push,”  Morning Call, (Jan. 9, 2018), p. 17.

Tuesday, January 9, 2018

Israel and El Salvador

Israel is giving a stark choice to thousands of refugees from Africa.  They can either go to jail or take $3500 and a plane ride to any African country that will accept them.  When I read this, I thought I would post a scathing condemnation of the cruelty of the Israeli government.

I had second thoughts when I considered that the U.S. does not give its deportees any choice.  They are jailed first, then deported with no money at all.

I had those second thoughts even before the new policy was announced on refugees from El Salvador.  George Bush admitted about 200,000 in 2001 after a devastating earthquake in that country.  They have been here for over a decade, hold jobs, have children who are American citizens, and fit in quite well.

New policy.  We are sending them back.  No $3500.  Just sent back.


We have a terrible record..  The treatment of Indians, Irish immigrants, slaves, Jewish immigrants, freed blacks, the Chinese, Germans in World War I, Japanese in World War II, Latino farmworkers–it is depressing.  And now we are adding new chapters to the list.  What is wrong with us?

Monday, January 8, 2018

It's not China's fault

We live in a connected world.  When China stops taking our paper and plastics, it ripples all the way down to Franklin and Lower Towamensing Townships, both of which have ended their recycling programs.

Why have the Chinese stopped importing American recyclables?  Because they were getting “dirty wastes or even hazardous wastes.”

Amazingly, Towamewnsing Township, where I live, is continuing its recycling program, but I don’t think it will be for long.  Take a look in the paper recycling bins.  You will see chip board, paper wrapped in yellow bands, paper in plastic bags, cardboard, and pizza boxes.  People do not take responsibility for their actions.  Just chuck it in and hope somebody else will sort through it.  

Result:  recycling will soon end, our garbage bills will go up, and our landfills will expand.  All because people are too lazy to act in a responsible manner.  Am I bitter?  Of course I am.


For a full report on Chinese reluctance to take American “recyclables,” see Elizabeth Daigneau, “Pickup Hiccup,” Governing, (Jan. 28, 2018), p. 20.  To see what I’m talking about, take a look at the recycling bins behind the Towamensing Township Municipal Building on Stable Road.

Sunday, January 7, 2018

One State Solution

Ever since Trump recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, there has been a good deal of talk about abandoning the “two-state solution” with an Israel and a Palestine, and simply incorporating all of the Palestinian territories into a greater Israel.

This could happen, but it will mean one of two things.  Israel will be a democracy, but it will no longer be a Jewish state.  Muslims voters will predominate.  On the other hand, Israel will be a Jewish state, but it will no longer be a democracy.  It will need to keep Palestinians in a subordinate status.


Neither of those alternatives appeals to me.

Saturday, January 6, 2018

Rejection is painful

Last year voters in the Lehighton Area School District made it very clear that they did not like the members of the School Board.  To use the slogan of the challengers, the voters “flipped the board,” dumping Bowman, Eidem, and Krause.  

Now, because of a vacancy on the Board, a new member must be appointed.  Eight people, including the three already mentioned, along with Flickinger and Beltz, Jr., who were also defeated in the November election, have filed petitions to be appointed to the Board.  


Look people, take a hint.  The voters didn’t want you.  Go away.

Friday, January 5, 2018

77% would vote for black as U.S. President

I’m tossing old files.  No need to keep them any longer; I’m fairly certain I’ll never teach again.  Before I chuck them, I pick through them, and tonight I came across an article from the August 27, 1978, San Jose Mercury News entitled “77% would vote for black as U.S. President.” 

This was an amazing jump from earlier Gallup poll data.  In 1958, just 20 years earlier, only 38% said they would vote for a black candidate.  It is truly amazing how tolerant Americans have become.  


On the the other hand, we may have carried this tolerance too far.  In 2016 a near-majority voted for a moron.  

Thursday, January 4, 2018

What "True the Vote" should worry about

There’s a political action group called “True the Vote,” which ostensibly worries about in-person voter fraud and pushes for onerous id requirements.  The organization, of course, is a voter suppression group and an arm of the conservative movement.

I taught an American Government class to prisoners in Soledad Prison, a maximum security prison in the California system.  Students who passed the class received three credits from San Jose State University.  I was told never to ask what the students had done to get into Soledad, but I assumed it must have been pretty bad.  Only a small minority of the prisoners even qualified for the program; the average reading level at the prison was fourth grade.

It was the Fall 1984 semester, the time of the Mondale-Reagan race.  The election was a hot topic, and in the course of the semester, I discovered the students, who were roughly1/3 Latino, 1/3 African-American, and 1/3 Anglo, were also overwhelmingly Democratic in orientation.  Of course, they couldn’t vote while they were in Soledad, but after they had served their sentences, they could. 

Not so in Florida.  Florida leads the nation in the number of disenfranchised voters.  Approximately 1.5 million of its citizens, more than the population of 11 states, are not allowed to vote because criminal records.  It doesn’t matter if you were in for murder or for driving with a suspended license, you can’t vote in Florida unless the governor grants clemency.  

The governor is Rick Scott, a Republican.  Very few released prisoners are granted clemency.


If “True the Vote” cares about the voting franchise, they ought to get on that.  

Wednesday, January 3, 2018

Penna. law on election petitions

Under Pennsylvania law a statewide candidate needs 5000 signatures to get on the ballot.  The catch is that the candidate must obtain at least 250 of those signatures in each of ten different counties.

It’s relatively easy to get those signatures in Philadelphia or Pittsburgh, but almost impossible to get them in Forest or Elk.  Voters in small-population counties have more power than voters in large population counties.  The requirement is even more difficult for minor party candidates.

Pennsylvania is the only state to have such a law.  On December 13 the Third Circuit issued a decision asking Pennsylvania to explain why this requirement is necessary, and why it doesn’t violate the one-man, one vote standard.  

The U.S. District Court will hold a hearing on this on January 10.  If I were the District Court Judge.


Info for this post was taken from “Ballot Access News,” (January 1, 2018), p. 1.

Tuesday, January 2, 2018

It's what god wants

Israeli leaders are now pushing to annex settlements on the West Bank.

According to Israeli Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan, speaking to a crowd of 1000 members of Likud’s central committee, “We are telling the world that it doesn’t matter what the nations of the world say.  The time has come to express our biblical right to the land.”


This is policy-making according to 3000-year-old folk tales.  It is totally nuts, but typical of Muslims, Jews, Christians, Hindus, and anyone else who decides they are in possession of revealed truths unavailable to those of us not members of the tribe.

Monday, January 1, 2018

Angry monkeys

Today’s post is written by guest blogger Linda Christman.

Bret Stephens, a conservative columnist for the New York Times, recently wrote that once people got a small tax cut, they wouldn’t care that the bulk of the benefits would go to corporations and the richest Americans.

I disagree.  I recall an experiment where two monkeys were given the same reward of one banana for doing a simple task.  After a time, the reward for one monkey was doubled while the other continued to get one banana.  You would think that the short-changed monkey would be perfectly happy.  After all, he continued to gat a banana for his task.  He wasn’t happy.  He exhibited monkey anger and flung unpleasant things at the experimenter.  Apparently, monkeys have a sense of what is fair.  

The Republican tax bill is the same.  When taxpayers compare their tax cut to those granted to the wealthy, they will be angry.


Even a monkey could see that.