Kids-for-cash judge released

Michael Conahan was released last week with six years left on his sentence because of coronavirus considerations.  

Conahan sent hundreds of kids to for-profit detention centers in return for kickbacks.  Many of the juveniles were completely innocent or were guilty of minor offenses, but he sent them anyway for personal gain.  

He has to be one of the most despicable judges in the history of Pennsylvania, and I don’t understand why he was released.  So he gets the virus.  So he suffers.  Hundreds of kids suffered years of abuse because of this evil man.  The son-of-a-bitch should have died in prison, alone, in pain.

Manicurists, barbers, and police

According to an article in “The Week” (June 26, 2020, p. 16), in North Carolina licensed barbers need 1,528 hours of training.  Police officers need 620 hours.

In Florida licensed interior designers need 1,760 hours of training.  Police officers need 770 hours.

In Louisiana, a licensed manicurist needs 500 hours.  A police officer needs 360 hours of training.

Sidetracked

The Black Lives Matter movement is one I generally (note the qualifier generally) support, but some of its followers have gotten lost.  I have known about unfair policing for decades.  I’ve had students pulled over for DWB’s, and I worked part-time in a West Oakland warehouse for well over a decade, so I knew about racist cops.  It is important to give Americans a seminar on these matters, and it is vitally important that reforms are made. 

If you’re waiting for a “but,” here it is.

First of all the slogan “defund the police” is an absolutely terrible slogan.  I know that most of the people who use it explain that they don’t really mean to defund police departments, but they want better training, personal liability, public records of bad cops, more community policing, more emphasis on violence prevention, and other reforms.  Note what I just had to do.  I had to explain “defund the police.”  Any slogan that takes a long explanation is not a good slogan.

It is also important to build coalitions.  Sometimes to build coalitions you need to compromise or pull back from the ideal.  Pulling down statues of Christopher Columbus might make some people feel like they are doing something important, but alienating Italian-Americans, many of whom revere Columbus, is not a good idea.

It is also obvious that some of the activists themselves need to learn more history.  No statues of the Confederate general Longstreet have been pulled down, and none will be.  Longstreet, who was one of the most able of the Confederate generals, supported Reconstruction, endorsed Presidential candidate U. S. Grant, and opposed the Ku Klux Klan.  There are no statues to General Longstreet anywhere in the South.  I’m afraid if there were, some millennials who don’t know their history would say, “Yes, but he was a Confederate, so let’s pull down his statue.”

The issue of policing in America is too important to get sidetracked.

Starving Time is officially over

Early settlers sometimes referred to late winter/early spring as the “starving time.”  All of the potatoes, cabbage, winter squash, and turnips had been eaten, but the summer crops were just emerging from the ground.  People were reduced to eating dandelion and grass.

Starving time is now over.  In fact, we are overwhelmed with bok choy, onions, collards, leeks, peas, garlic, lettuce, red beets, kale, potatoes, and rhubarb.  Soon the squash and cucumbers and beans will arrive, followed by tomatoes, okra, peppers, cabbage, and eggplants.

Am I bragging about my garden?  Maybe just a little.

Do they not see?

A new poll was released today.  Biden holds a 14-point edge over Trump.  For females, it was 55% to 33%.  Evidently one third of American women see nothing wrong with Trump’s contempt for women.

Hispanics broke 64% to 25%.  Evidently one-fourth of American Hispanics don’t have a problem with Trump’s contempt toward Hispanics and his belittling of Puerto Ricans and Mexicans.

White people with a college education broke 58% to 30%.  Evidently one third of American college graduates don’t have a problem with Trump’s denigration of science, rational thought, and knowledge in general.

If the election were held today, 90% of the Republicans would vote for Trump.  That means that nine out of ten Republicans have no problem with the nepotism, the corruption, the contempt for the values of free speech and a free press, the sheer incompetence in fighting the Covid 19 virus, the abandonment of environmental standards, the loss of prestige and power abroad, the constant lies, the uninformed appointees, the sucking up to dictators, the bullying, and the sheer meanness of the man.  

This is not the country in which I grew up.

Screwing with the census

There is nothing this Administration won’t do to retain power.  One way to suppress votes and aid red states is to undercount the liberal areas.  The Census Bureau has now added two political appointees to top positions.  

There is no good reason for this.  If you think I am paranoid, remember that even paranoids have enemies.  Would you think this action has no malicious intent?  Would you think the Administration is doing this to improve the Census?  Of course not.

See Michael Wines, “Census Bureau Adds Top-Level Political Posts, Raising Fears for the 2020 Count,”  New York Times, (June 24, 2020), p., A 17.  The fact that this is was on page 17 of today’s paper shows that there are too many scandals to keep track of.  Had this been the Bush or Obama administrations, this would have been a screaming headline on the front page.  That headline was that the European Union is probably going to ban travelers from the U.S. because of our botched response to the Covid 19 virus.

Statues

The Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission is the agency in charge of putting up those blue historical markers you see around the state.  About seven of them, including two in Carbon County, commemorate the infamous “Walking Purchase,” when European settlers cheated the Lenni Lenape out of thousands of square miles of land.  

I asked the director of the sign division if the Commission had thought about taking down the signs, since we have reevaluated that whole sordid incident.  She told me that the signs themselves are considered part of the historical record.  That is the way people thought when the signs were put up, and the signs themselves illustrate a moment in time.

Fair enough.  I get that.  While we might not put up a statue to Christopher Columbus today, at one time he was a hero to the Italian community.  We ignored the bad things he did, since he “discovered” America and changed global history.  We shouldn’t change the statue or tear it down; we need to change the way we think about what is sometimes called “the Columbian exchange.”

Same with Andrew Jackson.  He was thought to be a hero of the common man, and the “Trail of Tears” was ignored.  Now we remember that, but we may forget that during “Jacksonian democracy,” white people who owned no property were finally allowed to vote.

We also forget that political leaders are complicated people.  Teddy Roosevelt was an imperialist, but he was also responsible for national parks.  Martin Luther King was a great civil rights leader, but he also cheated on his wife.  Nixon was deserving of impeachment, but he also was largely responsible for the E.P.A.

Finally, here is some advice for the kids who would tear down the statue of Columbus in Easton, Pennsylvania, because of his treatment of Native Americans.  Forget 500 years ago.  Native Americans are dying at a higher rate from the Covid 19 virus than any other group in America.  Native Americans are still at the bottom of the educational scale.  Still the poorest group.  Still getting run over by illegal pipelines.  Still given a hard time when they try to vote.  Still getting sacred lands ripped up by fracking and mining.  You want to do something?  Forget Christopher fucking Columbus and start to act on what is happening now, in 2020, in America.

I told you so

Last night I posted a screed about what I thought was an over-emphasis on science and technology in our schools and the problems that resulted from that.  I decried the failure to teach civics or social sciences or ethics.  

Ok, ready?  Within one hour after I posted that, I’m reading an article by Danielle Allen, the James Bryant Conant University Professor and Director of the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University that appeared in the July/August issue of Foreign Affairs.  I never met Dr. Allen, but I like her very much.  Here is a portion of her article:

In the 1950s, most high schools offered students three separate civics courses; today, they usually offer only one, and 15 percent of the students don’t even get that.  Eleven states have no civics education requirements whatsoever.  The federal government spends $54 per student per year on the STEM fields.  The figure for civics education:  five cents.  No wonder then, that in 2018, the National Assessment of Educational Progress, a set of exams administered by the U.S. Department of Education, found that only 24 percent of eighth graders were proficient in civics.  

Foreign Affairs, by the way, is a wonderful periodical, with thoughtful articles by experts.  It is non ideological and covers foreign policy issues in depth.  It is a pleasure to read.

NOTE TO READERS:  Google changed the configuration of the blog program I use for no good reason I can ascertain.  I don’t even know how to reply to comments readers make, and I have already posted a draft as well as what I meant to post.  I’ll be bringing in my IT person (my cousin Debbie) to sort all of this out.  Be patient.

I blame STEM

In San Francisco some idiots toppled a statue of U. S. Grant.  Grant, a poor farmer, freed the one slave he owned rather than sell him to make money.  He was the most important general in defeating the Confederacy.  He was the President who favored the right of ex-slaves to vote.  He was the president who sent Federal troops into the South to defend ex-slaves against violence and intimidation.

A big problem is that when we only emphasize Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, we forget history, civics, and literature.  Many high schools, including those in Carbon County, Pennsylvania, no longer teach civics.  It isn’t on the state test.

As a consequence, students graduate not knowing about separation of powers, limits on the presidency, checks and balances, or the difference between federal and state powers.  They don’t know American history.  They don’t understand the issues in the Civil War, or the New Deal, or the Civil Rights movement.  

There is a reason why there are so many Trump supporters.  There is a reason that people fall prey to conspiracy theories or can’t tell truth from bullshit.  

There is more to life than STEM.  The humanities and the social sciences teach people to think rationally and ethically.  That seems to have gone missing in America.

I'm a racist troll. Find me on Facebook

Zuckerberg recently wrote a long post denouncing racism and said Facebook would donate $10 million to racial justice organizations.

This has been compared to MacDonalds announcing that it would give money to vegan groups, but would not change its menu.

Facebook is one of the leading platforms for racists and bigots to spread their hatred.  A monologue by the black right-wing activist Candace Owens, who said the idea of racially biased policing was a “fake narrative,” had 100 million views on the same day Zuckerberg spoke favorably about Black Lives Matter.  It doesn’t matter what Zuckerberg says; it is what Facebook does.

At this point you are expecting me to smugly point out that I am not on Facebook.  So ok, I’m not on Facebook.  I don’t understand why anyone is.  In life we often have to compromise with evil.  I get that.  What I don’t get is why compromise with it when it isn’t necessary.

I learned about Candace Owens in an article by Kevin Roose, “Platforms Denounce Racism That Thrives There,”  New York Times, (June 20, 2020), pp. B1, B5.

Vera Lynn

Vera Lynn died on Thursday in Sussex, England.  She was 103.  During the darkest days of World War II Ms. Lynn gave hope and comfort to British soldiers with her song “The White Cliffs of Dover.”  She sang in a theater during the Blitz and sometimes had to sleep there until the all-clear sounded.  You have probably heard the song, but if not, you can find it on YouTube.  It is wonderful and still moving.

Finland gains independence

After the Paradise Fire Trump noted that one reason Finland didn’t have forest fires of that intensity was because the Finns swept their forest floors.  We soon had proof of this as Finns posted pictures on social media of Finns in forests with rakes, brooms, dustbins, and even vacuum cleaners.  The mockery was hilarious.

Now we learn from Bolton’s book that Trump thought that Finland was a part of Russia.  What I want to know is how a man who knew that much about Finland’s forest maintenance wouldn’t know that Finland was an independent country.

Livin' on Tulsa Time

That’s a really great song by Don Williams, but also my lead-in to the Trump rally scheduled for Tulsa, Oklahoma.  I saw on TV that people are already lined up to get in.  As you probably know if you have read any posts, I am not a Trump supporter.  On the other hand, if I were, I would definitely be on the road to Tulsa.

Think about the camaraderie.  Think about the sense of power you will get from meeting Trump supporters from all over the U.S.  You can show your loyalty by not wearing masks, sitting close together, and staying in a closed arena for hours.  Don’t worry if you have little fever or a cough.  That is probably just pollen or the common cold.  Besides, the virus is over-hyped by the liberal media, and probably no more than a few hundred people have died from it.  You really don’t need to sign that waiver promising you won’t sue if you would catch it.

Don’t worry, be happy, and support your leader.  It is the least you can do.  And remember–no masks.

Carbon County in the New York Times

Today’s Times had a full two-page spread with a map of all the towns in the U.S. that had demonstrations for racial justice in the last two weeks.  Every state in the nation had protests and demonstrations, including North and South Dakota, Wyoming, Alaska, and Idaho.  Pennsylvania had a large number of towns listed, including Lehighton and Palmerton.  I think Lansford also had one, but maybe the list was compiled before that one occurred.

Our little county is not exactly a hot bed of activism.  It went for Trump big time in 2016.  Less than three percent of its population is African American. Most of the people in the protests, including LInda, were white.  I’m proud of our county.  We did well.  

P.S.:  I'm also rather pleased with our Supreme Court.  Way to go Roberts and Gorsuch.  Who would have thought?  It's been a good day.

Anti-gay bigotry in Virginia

Rep. Denver Riggleman of Virginia, a freshman congressman, lost his primary in a state convention to Bob Good, an official at Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University.  Mr. Good describes himself as “biblical conservative,” although I would describe him as a bigot and a total jerk.

What happened is that Mr. Riggleman, who is so far to the right that Trump endorsed him, officiated at a wedding of two of his former campaign volunteers, who happened to be gay guys.  That was too much for Republican troglodytes, and they selected Bob Good.

Democrats in the district see this as a great opportunity to pick up another seat.  Virginians generally look on bigots with disfavor.

Allentown

I am a big fan of Allentown, including its art museum, its restaurants, its neighborhoods, and its attempts to improve, which seem to be succeeding.  My friend Tom from Grass Valley sent me a link to a cable news story about Allentown.  If you haven’t visited the town recently, or even if you have, I think you would enjoy the story.  

Here is the link.

https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2020/politics/allentown-pennsylvania-race-2020-election/

Having fun with solicitation calls

My landline phone (the only one I have) does not tell me the number or the name of the person who is calling.  I answer everything, including all calls trying to interest me in electric power rebates, medical devices, car warranties, medicare supplements, solicitations for charity, and so many more, sometimes up to nine or ten a day.

Since I don’t have many hobbies, I use these calls for amusement.  For the ones that say they can provide me with some kind of rebate, I immediately tell them, “Look, I’ve already told you, send the money to Jim Smith, 123 Pine Road, etc.  I’m tired of waiting.  Where is my check?”  They try to explain, and I keep repeating, “I want my money,” until they hang up in frustration. 

I tell the medical insurance callers that I have all kinds of diseases.  I tell the ones targeting old people that I’m 24.  I tell the car warranty people that I only have a bicycle.  I sometimes see how long I can keep the callers on the line before they hang up in disgust.  

Occasionally I tell them they always have a choice; they don’t have to take a job scamming old people.  I sometimes ask really stupid questions, or I tell them I am so lonely and ask personal questions, or I tell them I’m not wearing any clothes.  It is much more fun than simply hanging up or getting angry.

My best experience was when I said, “You are a robot, right?  You are really a robot.”  The caller then said in a very robotic voice, spacing every word, “I am not a robot.”  I told him he made my day.  

Confronting a bear

Yesterday I looked out of the window to see what birds were feeding in our back yard, and there is a large black bear with our suet cake in his mouth.  I had just put that cake out no more than an hour before, and here is this bear walking off with it like a dog with a frisbee in its mouth.  Those cakes cost about $2.00, and it really irritated me.  I went out the back door and yelled "Drop it!”

The bear looked over at me, didn’t change his pace, and continued on his way.  I’ll admit it was kind of neat to see a bear that close, but the attitude still bugs me.  Aren’t they supposed to be afraid of humans?  If it happens again I am going to go after him (or her, I can’t tell the difference) with the broom.

ICE blocked from courthouse arrests

If you were undocumented immigrant who witnessed a crime, and you were called to testify, would you?  Would you testify knowing that ICE agents were waiting at the courthouse to arrest you?

This is not a hypothetical question.  In Brooklyn ICE agents threw an immigrant leaving the courthouse against the wall, then hustled him into a car with no license plates.  Bystanders thought he had been kidnapped, and in a way he had been.  That was just one of many examples presented in a lawsuit filed by New York State authorities.

On Wednesday a federal District Court judge in Manhattan ordered ICE to stop arresting people on the grounds of any New York State courthouse or as they travel to a courthouse as a party or witness to a lawsuit.  

However, I think ICE can still do that in Pennsylvania and other states.

See Benjamin Weiser, “Federal Judge Rules Against Immigration Arrests at New York Courts,”  New York Times, (June 11, 2020), A18.

Baiting bears, killing pups

The National Park Service published new rules for hunting in Alaska, overturning regulations set during the Obama administration.  Under the new rules, it will be ok to kill wolves and coyotes during the season when these animals wean their young.  This will include pups.  Quite a sport, killing baby wolves.  

It will also be ok to hunt bears with dogs.  It will be ok to bait grizzly bears with doughnuts soaked in bacon grease.  It will be ok to use spotlights to blind and shoot hibernating black bear mothers and their cubs in their dens.  It will be ok to gun down swimming caribou from motorboats.

These rule changes are mainly at the behest of Donald Trump, Jr., a “trophy” hunter who thinks of himself as a “sportsman.”  Maybe he can mount a baby coyote in his den.

See Lisa Friedman, “Trump Administration Reinstates Banned Hunting Methods in Alaska,” New York Times, (June 10, 2020), p. A22.

Bribing growers

Let’s call it what it is.  The Trump administration is bribing growers in agricultural states rich in electoral college votes. 

Cotton farmers were paid 33 times as much in subsidies in 2019 as the income they lost in the trade war.  $28 billion went to aid farmers because of the trade wars, and you can be that the bulk of that money did not go to small family farms.  Jim Justice, the billionaire Republican Governor of West Virginia, collected $375,000 in trade relief payments.  I doubt if he needed our tax money.

Trump noted the rise in farm incomes in January.  “Under three years of my administration net farm income has already gone up nearly 50 percent and will now be rising even faster.”  That’s our money.

According to an article in the Times News last week two guys in a pickup truck yelled at a protestor in Palmerton, complaining that their hard earned money went to taxes to pay for welfare and SNAP payments to minorities.  

Yeah, but not the minorities they are thinking about.  It goes to CEOs, corporate farmers, the already rich who fatten at the public trough.  The corruption of this administration is truly amazing, and yet a third of the people blame hungry people and ignore the subsidies for the greedy gluttons at the top.

The statistics are from Sharon LaFraniere, “More Billions to Farms, This Time for Virus Aid,” New York Times (June 8, 2020), p. A1, A10.

Occupy Wall Street

Think about the demonstrations during “Occupy Wall Street”?  Do you remember all the reforms that came out of those demonstrations?  Changes in banking regulations?  Changes in the income tax code?  Changes in the way hedge funds operate?  An increase in workers’ wages and a corresponding decrease in the salaries of CEOs.

Of course you don’t, because they never happened.  Joe Hill said it best:  “Don’t mourn, organize.”  Demonstrations make you feel good.  I’ve been in enough of them to know, but I also know that by themselves they have little impact.  With social media and instant communications, demonstrations are even easier to put together, but to what end?

Police unions give millions in campaign contributions.  They have internal cohesion.  They testify at hearings, and they often successfully resist civilian review boards and elected officials.  They have organized power.

When I hear demonstrators say “Voting isn’t meaningful” or “I voted for years and nothing changed,” I cringe.  Do they really think a few signs and a few chants and a few marches will do more?

I am not saying people should not demonstrate.  It calls attention to a problem.  It brings people together in solidarity.  What I am saying is that with the demonstrations should come organization.  We have a right to peacefully assemble, but that “assembly” is also interpreted as the right to form groups.  Every demonstration should include organizers with a very long attention span taking names, emails, ands voter registrations.

Japanese barberry banned

Most readers of this blog are probably aware that I often try to do a form of “counter programming.”  That’s when the Super Bowl is broadcast, but the other networks run programs like “The Sound of Music” or “Frozen.”

So instead of writing about the divisiveness of Trump, or the way Fox “News” keeps saying that peaceful demonstrations are violent riots, or that “The Rev” Al Sharpton makes a terrible spokesman for racial injustice, I will write about the positive step West Virginia has taken to ban the sale of Japanese Barberry.

This is an invasive plant, full of thorns, and not eaten by deer, so it crowds out native plants.  It spreads quickly (I can show you some in Beltzville State Park less than half a mile from our house), and it is tough to eradicate.

The question is not why West Virginia banned the sale of this plant, but why any state would allow its sale at all.

See “Sale of Japanese Barberry in W.Va. Outlawed July 1,” Lancaster Farming, (June 6, 2020), p. A21.

Mussolini in Lafayette Park

For days now I’ve been trying to remember where I saw a spectacle like the one where Trump struts through Lafayette Park, his toadies following behind.  It finally came to me.  He resembles old film clips of Mussolini strutting around, puffing out his chest, and trying to act tough.  

Not a good role model, but somehow appropriate for Trump.

Tomorrow is the anniversary of D-Day.  How far we have fallen.

Good news from yesterday's primary

Ferguson, Missouri, elected its first black mayor yesterday.  Ella Jones, a pastor at the African Methodist Episcopal Church, received 54% of the vote.

In New Mexico 17 women won Democratic primaries for the state legislature, and Teresa Fernandez was nominated for a House District race.  In Iowa 11 women won primaries for the state legislature.  In Monroe County in PA, Claudette Williams, a black woman, won the primary to represent her state House district.  In Idaho Paulette Jordan, a Native American, won the Democratic Senate primary, although she faces a tough battle in November.  

We keep chipping away.

Material for this post was taken from “A Day of Historic Wins for Women of Color,” New York Times, (June 4, 2020), p. A24.

Christo

So much to discuss.  Linda participating in a demonstration in Lehighton at the McCall Bridge, General Mattis criticizing Trump, demonstrators and cops hugging each other and demonstrators cleaning up the streets, Biden acting presidential, the Pennsylvania primary, Hong Kong, Facebook employees criticizing Zuckerberg, Steven King losing his primary, Trump hiding in his bunker–it is just too much.

So I’ll talk about Christo.  I was living in San Jose when he did his “running fence” in Marin County, and I regret not going to see it.  We did drive to New York to see the gates in Central Park, and they were wonderful.  The Park was full of people walking around in awe, enjoying the spectacle, and having a great time.  

If art is in the eye of the beholder, then I fully accept that the gates were art.  I loved what Christo did.  His art was massive, ephemeral, whimsical, and managed to draw attention to our environment.  The world is a lesser place with his passing.

Hell of a job, Donnie

My friend Bill from North Carolina keeps me up-to-date on trending memes.  This one I just had to share:

Hell of a job, Donnie.  You’ve managed to bring back the 1918 pandemic, the 1929 depression, and the 1968 race riots at the same time.

A failure of American democracy

It won’t be the first time.  There’s a long history of terrible things this country has done.  I’m not about to recount them all, but I will mention the Trail of Tears, the prejudice against Irish, the failure of Reconstruction, the treatment of Chinese immigrants, the battles against organized labor, the segregation of the armed forces through World War II, and the Japanese internment.  The important thing, as I tried to make clear to my American studies classes, was that always there were voices–sometimes still and very small voices–that were raised against injustice, against bigotry, against evil.

Once again we need to hear those voices.  Attacks on peaceful demonstrators, a president calling for violence, and more than a third of American voters backing a man who has no understanding of democratic values or the First Amendment are all examples of a failure of the 

American experiment.  

This time the voices should not be still and very small.  Speak out.  Our democratic experiment, and it is always tentative and need of defense, is under attack.  It is not inevitable that democratic values will triumph.  I know I will be thought to be alarmist, but who will come to the defense of American democracy?  Senator Toomey?  Mitch McConnell?  Republican Senators?  Fox News?  

It is up to people like us.