Working the Ukrainian Festival

Each year the Democratic Party has a booth at the Ukrainian Festival in Carbon County.  We give away small Ukrainian flags and plastic bracelets, have candidate literature available, collect money for a Ukrainian charity that helps bombing victims, and display four large posters with quotations by Trump and Vance praising Putin and criticizing Zelenskyy.

It is wonderful to bask in the warmth of the support of hundreds of people.  In the entire afternoon we had two negative passersby, including a MAGA supporter who claimed the Democratic Party was filled with Communists.  Everyone else gave us thumbs up, snapped pictures of the posters, took flags, and engaged in friendly discussions.  It was a great day.

The Republican Party did not have a booth.

Dayton, Ohio

“Would you like to come over for tea with the missus and me?  It’s a real nice way to spend the day in Dayton, Ohio, on a lazy Sunday afternoon in 1903.”

That’s from a wonderful Randy Newman song which you can hear on YouTube.  Dayton must still be a nice place.  It has immigrants from over 100 countries, including India, China, Vietnam, Haiti, and Rwanda.  

The City Council decided to remove all Flock cameras.  It was afraid ICE would use the data to harass immigrants.  I’ve never been to Dayton, but it sounds like my kind of town.

Rival conceptions of nationhood in the West

In an article entitled “Continental Drift” in the Aug. 17 issue of the New Yorker, Ian Buruma writes:

Since the nineteenth century, the Western world has been divided between two rival conceptions of nationhood:  the nation as a community of blood and faith, and the nation as a democratic state of citizens of equal rights.

That is one of the best summaries of the difference between the Republicans and the Democrats of today.  Listen to any speech by Trump or Hegseth or Vance, and you will hear the former.  Listen to any speech by any Democratic Senate candidate, and you will hear the latter.  

As the old labor song said, “Which side are you on, boys, which side are you on?”

 

Rounding up the "tonks"

I’ve heard that ICE agents are tired of being called “Gestapo.”  If that is the case, then they should quit acting like the Gestapo.  Agents are now referring to Mexican immigrants as “tonks.”  That is supposedly the sound made when one of those big flashlights is brought down on a Mexican immigrant’s head.  In light of that, Gestapo seems all too apt.

It is obvious that brown people are targets, whether American citizens or not.  And the rot starts at the top, where ICE administrators are issuing quotas of 3000 arrests a day.  And now our local municipalities are signing agreements to partner with ICE in return for funding.  

Hey Dumbass

It’s not your House.  We own it.  You rent it, and your lease expires on Jan. 20, 2028.  We will be inspecting for damages, and you will not only lose your deposit, but there will be additional charges for damage the damage to the East Wing and all that gold crap you put everywhere.

The Court of Appeals finally spelled it out for you, but we always knew it. Many of us have been tenants; some of us still are.  Any renter can tell you; there’s a lease with rules.  You have broken the rental agreement.  You will will be required to pay for all that damage.  Dumbass.

Intelligent parents

When I was looking through some old family records this morning, I found a smallpox vaccination certification dated June 21, 1947.  It was given by Dr. Kenneth G. Reinheimer, who had an office in Weissport, PA.  I was 4, and I don’t remember it, but I’m sure I cried.

We don’t need those any more because parents all over the globe had their kids vaccinated.  Smallpox has been eradicated.

I also found my sister’s and my polio vaccination records.  They were in 1956.  I was 13, and I remember that.  I didn’t cry.  The vaccine was made by Eli Lilly & Co.  Evidently there were three doses; at least that is what the certification says. 

In any case, I didn’t get polio.  I remember seeing those pictures of kids in iron lungs–the ones who didn’t die.  That was scary.

I did get measles.  We didn’t have a vaccine for measles in the 50s.  Or mumps.  Or whooping cough.  The medicine has advanced.  The parents have gotten dumber.

A question for any Republican running for the U. S. House or Senate

I saw an ad for Rep. Bresnahan tonight.  Some constituent was testifying about how Rep.Bresnahan cares.  Not he doesn’t.  He spent the last yer and a half supporting Trump’s every move.  Hold his feet to the fire.  

If you are ever at a campaign event with Bresnahan or any other candidate for the House or the Senate and have a chance to ask questions, just ask:

When Trump was tearing down the East Wing for a ballroom, why didn’t you speak up?

Or, when Trump was appointing people like Hegseth and Robert Kennedy Jr., why didn’t you speak up?

Or, when Trump was gutting the Endangered Species Act, why didn’t you speak up?

Notice that you can do this with literally hundreds of things Trump did or did not do.  Greenland, the war in Iran, the tariffs, the tax cuts for the rich, the pardoning of criminals, the claims of voter fraud, and on, and on.  Literally hundreds of bad things, and each one ends with this question:  WHY DIDN’T YOU SPEAK UP?

Watch the cowards squirm.