How the Trump campaign works

My sister is smart, follows the news, and keeps abreast of political activity.  Today we were discussing whether or not the PennEast pipeline, now scheduled to bisect our farm to transport gas from fracking wells, will be built.  My sister pointed out that Biden plans to end fracking in Pennsylvania.  She said she saw him say it on a political ad.

I explained that this was a Trump campaign ad.  Biden said he would end fracking on state-owned lands.  The Trump people doctored his statement so that it appears that Biden will end ALL fracking operations.

My sister said, “Can they do that?”  Not morally, but legally the answer is “yes.”  This is how the Trump campaign operates.  Fracking, which I personally think is a disaster for the environment, provides thousands of jobs in Pennsylvania.  There is no way Biden could end it and win the state.  Nonetheless, the Trump campaign is willing to doctor his statement.  Trump people have no moral principles whatsoever, and yet they may win.  

Last night I woke up at 3 a.m. and couldn’t fall asleep.  No wonder.  This country is about to go down the tubes, and millions of people are willing participants in its destruction.  

Stimulus funds for dead people

One expects a certain level of incompetence from the Trump administration.  All you have to do is look at Trump’s cabinet appointees, advisors, sycophants, and court jesters.,  Still, there are times when my mind is boggled.

The Treasury Department, working with the IRS, mailed more than a million stimulus payments to dead people.  The amount sent to dead people was $1.4 billion.  $1.4 BILLION.

I did get my check.  Most of it has gone to the Democratic Party and Democratic candidates. 

I found this info in Alan Rappeport, “$1.4 Billion in Stimulus Funds Were Sent to Dead People, Watchdog Finds,”  New York Times, (June 26, 2020), p. 5.  

Police reform in Pennsylvania

The Pennsylvania Legislature, both House and Senate, passed two bills related to police reform on UNANIMOUS VOTES. You couldn’t get a bill supporting apple pie and motherhood through the Pennsylvania legislature on a unanimous vote.

Both bills are meaningful.  One requires that a police department that is hiring must conduct background checks on job applicants that require an applicant’s former department to disclose information on that applicant’s employment history, including complaints and reasons the applicant left the job.  Amazingly, this was never a requirement in the past.

The second bill says that officers must be trained every other year in interactions with people of different racial and ethnic backgrounds and receive annual training on de-escalation techniques.

I am amazed and delighted.  If you wonder if all those demonstrations had an effect, I think you would have to admit that they did, at least in Pennsylvania.

This also means that even our Representative, Doyle Heffley, voted for these bills.  Will wonders ever cease.?

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.