"The Global Consciousness Project, also known as the EGG Project, is an international multidisciplinary collaboration of scientists, engineers, artists and others continuously collecting data from a global network of physical random number generators located in 65 host sites worldwide. The archive contains over 10 years of random data in parallel sequences of synchronized 200-bit trials every second."
Archive for the ‘– Lost In Space: TOTALLY Discombobulated’ Category
This belongs… somewhere I do not know. But not in the sense that you don’t know where, but that you don’t KNOW where – because you’ve never experienced it. That is to say, not knowledge itself, but rather comprehension.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, October 22, 2020
It’s a good thing that American Presidents don’t nominate weirdos or extremists for the Supreme Court.
Amy Coney Barrett as Hannibal Lector, the psychotic, psychopathic weirdo in the movie series “Silence of the Lambs.”
People who have 7 kids – adopted, or not – are certainly outside the norm.
As is forbidding the use of birth control – and that’s almost exclusively a religious matter.
And now that businesses can have religion, which god do they worship – Mammon? Was it the Commerce Clause that Jesus died for? Or, was it people?
But after all, “businesses are people, my friend.”
And since money is free speech, what’s next?
To be frank, being outside the norm is not illegal in the United States.
It’s not illegal to be a weirdo.
Goodness knows, there are plenty of them in all 50 states.
Belonging to a weird religious cult shouldn’t disqualify one for service – at least according to the Constitution, which has a renown “no religious test” clause.
I mean, we could have, and there is no legal compunction forbidding, Moonies to serve us in our government – any government, federal, state, or local – and, that’s perfectly A-okay according to the Constitution – as it should be.
People who believe the Earth is flat could serve us in government – and while there’s not a “no scientific test” clause in our Constitution, I would imagine that most reasonable people would agree that, like the Moonies, those who believe the Earth is flat are weirdos, and extremists.
People who believe in alchemy – the fraudulent and disproven notion that gold can be made from lead, various ores, or things that do not contain elemental gold – could be elected, or appointed, and serve us in our government.
Why, even those who have belonged to the Ku Klux Klan have served on the Supreme Court – Hugo Black, an Alabamian.
And the virulently infamous racist George C. Wallace was elected as Alabama’s governor FOUR times.
Revealed: Ex-members of Amy Coney Barrett faith group tell of trauma and sexual abuse
by Stephanie Kirchgaessner, in Washington, D.C.
Wednesday 21 Oct 2020, 0500 EDT
Last modified on Wednesday 21 Oct 2020, 2337 EDT
Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to the supreme court has prompted former members of her secretive faith group, the People of Praise, to come forward and share stories about emotional trauma and – in at least one case – sexual abuse they claim to have suffered at the hands of members of the Christian group.
In the wake of the allegations, the Guardian has learned that the charismatic Christian organization, which is based in Indiana, has hired the law firm of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan to conduct an “independent investigation” into sexual abuse claims on behalf of People of Praise.
The historic sexual abuse allegations and claims of emotional trauma do not pertain specifically to Barrett, who has been a lifelong member of the charismatic group, or her family.
But some former members who spoke to the Guardian said they were deeply concerned that too little was understood about the “community” of People of Praise ahead of Barrett’s expected confirmation by the Senate next week, after which she will hold the seat formerly held by the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Two people familiar with the matter say that more than two dozen former members of the faith group, many of whom say they felt “triggered” by Barrett’s nomination, are participating in a support group to discuss how the faith group affected their lives.
“The basic premise of everything at the People of Praise was that the devil controlled everything outside of the community, and you were ‘walking out from under the umbrella of protection’ if you ever left,” said one former member who called herself Esther, who had to join the group as a child but then left the organization. “I was OK with it being in a tiny little corner of Indiana, because a lot of weird stuff happens in tiny little corners in this country. But it’s just unfathomable to me – I can’t even explain just how unfathomable it is – that you would have a supreme court justice who is a card-carrying member of this community.”
Barrett was not asked about her involvement in People of Praise during her confirmation hearings last week, and has never included her involvement with the group in Senate disclosure forms, but has in the past emphasized that her religious faith as a devout Catholic would not interfere with her impartiality.
People of Praise is rooted in the rise of charismatic Christian communities in the late 1960s and 1970s, which Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Wednesday, October 21, 2020
To much chagrin, and outcry of many long-time WordPress users, the company unilaterally decided to switch to a “block editor.”
It has not gone over well.
Run atop JavaScript, “Gutenberg,” as it’s called, runs entirely in the web browser, according to the company.
The longtime, stable editor built using the WYSIWYG HTML editor TinyMCE which parlayed WordPress into a power player and preferred “provider” in the web design world, has come close to being abandoned, in lieu of something touted as “new and improved!”
It is not, and anything but.
The rollout was unceremonious.
It was almost as bad as a violently forced kiss on a first date – or, maybe even worse.
If some of the technical jargon is beyond you, not to worry, we’ll do our best to explain how this is not only applicable to you, but to all of their customer base – including the no-cost gratis accounts hosted on WordPress dot com, such as this site – and how they could have done better, and apparently, have taken a lesson from, at least for the time being.
First is Customer Service.
WordPress has been a pretty good company and enthusiastic member of the tech community, and has definitely found their niche as the practical backbone of the web design world insofar as a significant portion of the world’s major websites – some which you would immediately recognize were I to name them (Microsoft, the White House official site, the UK National Archives, Sony Music, UPS (United Parcel Service), Target, The New York Times, The Walt Disney Company, Tribune Media, Vivendi {a French multimedia company}, Toyota, the official site of the government of Sweden, Wired, Variety, Best Buy, Xerox, Etsy, Home Depot, Fortune, The New Yorker, Reuters, Skype, Yelp, Chicago Sun-Times, People, IBM, GoDaddy, etc.) – and comprise at least 37.6% of ALL websites, while 62% of the fastest growing companies do so.
WordPress has become a “Content Management System” (not to be confused with CMS – the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, a division of the Department of Health and Human Services of the U.S. government), which sounds all nice and knowledgeable, even “professional” – use of acronyms and abbreviations make it seem to others like you’re sophisticated. However, being plain-spoken is more admired, and reaches more people than being a jargon-using weisenheimer technogeek.
To date, WordPress has been responsive to the needs of their customers insofar as creating a usable, workable product, which is fully scalable to comport to the specific needs of each individual user. Whether BIG or small, WordPress had been responsive.
Next, is ease of use.
Artist’s rendition of what it might have looked like in Johannes Gutenberg’s printing press workshop.
WordPress’ learning curve has been short and shallow. Having emerged from the initial fray of bloggers, WordPress has emerged the clear winner. That includes among contenders like “the Great G,” also known as Google, which continues hosting their blogging service called “Blogger,” and among newcomers like Wix.com – which ostensibly, at least as it would seem, is what WordPress is working up against. Not that it’s a contender by any stretch of the imagination, but it promotes itself by claiming that “When you choose Wix, you don’t just get a drag and drop website builder. You get the whole package. Free reliable web hosting, top security, the best SEO and a dedicated support team to help you along the way.”
WordPress has long had, and continues to have, an excellent, even enviable, gratis service.
That solitary combined three-part claim – “free,” “reliable,” and “drag and drop” – has appeal. Among those who study such matters, the word “free” has continually shown itself to be a powerful and motivating word… because, everyone wants something for nothing. And in an increasingly costly world, “free” can be perceived as a significant benefit – even if it’s not all what it’s cracked up to be. And while reliability is almost taken for granted, though again, claims are not always what they’re cracked up to be.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Wednesday, October 21, 2020
This is what the soft hatred of bigotry cloaked in religious garb looks like.
This revelation should come as no surprise, that a radicalized right-wing religious zealot should serve at a high level on the Board of Directors for three schools in three separate states under a common umbrella would discriminate.
Below her image are three more images of the same type thing.
This person must NOT be confirmed to the nation’s highest court!
And toward that end, perhaps it may alarm you to know that a Ku Klux Klansman has been seated on the nation’s highest court.
You can read Matt Reimann’s excellently succinct August 15, 2017 article via the link above. Of note, Mr. Justice Black was also a “textualist” on matters of interpretation of the Constitution – the same thing late Justice Scalia said he was, and which Judge Barrett says she is.
“CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) — Mayor Lori Lightfoot said she is preparing for when Amy Coney Barrett takes her seat on the U.S. Supreme Court. She was asked to share her thoughts Tuesday on the judge and minced no words.
“Mayor Lightfoot was first asked if she views the U.S. Constitution as Judge Barrett does, as an “originalist.”
“Originalists firmly believe all statements in the U.S. Constitution must be strictly interpreted based on the original understanding at the time the Constitution was adopted. They do not believe in the concept of a “Living Constitution” that can be interpreted in the context of current times.
““You ask a gay, black woman if she is an originalist? No, ma’am, I am not,” Lightfoot laughed.
““That the Constitution didn’t consider me a person in any way, shape or form because I’m a woman, because I’m black, because I’m gay? I am not an originalist. I believe in the Constitution. I believe that it is a document that the founders intended to evolve and what they did was set the framework for how our country was going to be different from any other.
““But originalists say that, ‘Let’s go back to 1776 and whatever was there in the original language, that’s it.’ That language excluded, now, over 50 percent of the country. So, no I’m not an originalist.”
“Mayor Lightfoot said she’s deeply worried about some of Judge Barrett’s stated views, for instance, being against gay marriage.
““I deeply worry about this woman’s stated views. She’s on the record on a number of different things, not the least of which is thinking that gay marriage is something that shouldn’t be countenanced. And she’s got soulmates in Justice Thomas and others, who think that the decision by the Supreme Court…should somehow be rolled back,” Lightfoot said.
““What should I tell my daughter — that somehow now my wife and I are no longer married? That we’re no longer legitimately recognized in the eyes of the law? That is dangerous, dangerous territory. And what about a woman’s right to choose? We’re gonna keep re-litigating this issue, and we’re gonna make abortion illegal, as Amy Coney Barrett thinks it should be?”
“The Mayor also called Republicans “hypocrites” for pushing the Barrett nomination when they put off taking up the Merrick Garland nomination by President Obama.
“”The hypocrisy is something that is a bitter pill for me to swallow,” Lightfoot said.”
The September 13, 1937 front page of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette printed an image of Black’s KKK resignation letter.
“Hugo Black had been associate justice of the Supreme Court for less than a month when the news broke. In September of 1937, an exposé by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette found proof of Black’s membership in the Ku Klux Klan. He had joined in September of 1923, and resigned in July, 1925, as one of his first moves before running for one of Alabama’s U.S. Senate seat. Ironically, the smoking gun was Black’s resignation letter, written in legible longhand on Klan stationery, which appeared on the paper’s front page.
“Franklin Roosevelt, who nominated Hugo Black, was implicated in the scandal, which threatened to have far-reaching consequences for the president’s New Deal image. What was once seen as shrewd politics — the New Deal-friendly textualist was confirmed with a 63–16 vote — had become a disgrace. “Millions of Americans,” wrote one Indiana newspaper, “will not forget this sole tangible accomplishment of President Roosevelt’s attempted ‘liberalization’ of the Supreme Court.”
“When asked by the press to remark on the scandal, Roosevelt brushed questions aside, saying, “I only know what I have read in the newspapers. I know that the stories are appearing serially and their publication is not complete. Mr. Justice Black is in Europe where, undoubtedly, he cannot get the full text of these articles. Until such time as he returns, there is no further comment to be made.”“
apnews.com
Barrett Was Trustee At Private School With Anti-Gay Policies
By Michelle R. Smith and Michael Biesecker
October 21, 2020 at 10:51:08 AM CDT
Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett served for nearly three years on the board of private Christian schools that effectively barred admission to children of same-sex parents and made it plain that openly gay and lesbian teachers weren’t welcome in the classroom.
The policies that discriminated against LGBTQ people and their children were in place for years at Trinity Schools Inc., both before Barrett joined the board in 2015 and during the time she served.
The three schools, in Indiana, Minnesota and Virginia, are affiliated with People of Praise, an insular community rooted in its own interpretation of the Bible, of which Barrett and her husband have been longtime members. At least three of the couple’s seven children have attended the Trinity School at Greenlawn, in South Bend, Indiana.
The AP spoke with more than two dozen people who attended or worked at Trinity Schools, or former members of People of Praise. They said the community’s teachings have been consistent for decades: Homosexuality is an abomination against God, sex should occur only within marriage, and marriage should only be between a man and a woman.
Interviewees told the AP that Trinity’s leadership communicated anti-LGBTQ policies and positions in meetings, one-on-one conversations, enrollment agreements, employment agreements, handbooks and written policies — including those in place when Barrett was an active member of the board.
“Trinity Schools does not unlawfully discriminate with respect to race, color, gender, national origin, age, disability, or other legally protected classifications under applicable law, with respect to the administration of its programs,” said Jon Balsbaugh, president of Trinity Schools Inc., which runs the three campuses, in an email.
The actions are probably legal, experts said. Scholars said the school’s and organization’s teachings on homosexuality and treatment of LGBTQ people are harsher than those of the mainstream Catholic church. In a documentary released Wednesday, Pope Francis endorsed civil unions for the first time as pope, and said in an interview for the film that, “Homosexual people have the right to be in a family. They are children of God.”
Barrett’s views on whether LGBTQ people should have the same constitutional rights as other Americans became a focus last week in her Senate confirmation hearing. But her longtime membership in People of Praise and her leadership position at Trinity Schools were not discussed, even though most of the people the AP spoke with said her deep and decades-long involvement in the community signals she would be hostile to gay rights if confirmed.
Suzanne B. Goldberg, a professor at Columbia Law School who studies sexuality and gender law, said private schools have wide legal latitude to set admissions criteria. And, she said, Trinity probably isn’t covered by recent Supreme Court rulings outlawing employment discrimination against LGBTQ people because of its affiliation with a religious community. But, she added, cases addressing those questions are likely to come before the high court in the near future, and Barrett’s past oversight of Trinity’s discriminatory policies raises concerns.
“When any member of the judiciary affiliates themselves with an institution that is committed to discrimination on any ground, it is important to look more closely at how that affects the individual’s ability to give all cases a fair hearing,” Goldberg said.
The AP sent detailed questions for Barrett to the White House press office. Rather than providing direct answers, White House spokesman Judd Deere instead accused AP of attacking the nominee.
“Because Democrats and the media are unable to attack Judge Barrett’s sterling qualifications, they have instead turned to pathetic personal attacks on her children’s Christian school, even though the Supreme Court has repeatedly reaffirmed that religious schools are protected by the First Amendment,” Deere said in an email.
Nearly all the people interviewed for this story are gay or said they have gay family members. They used words such as “terrified,” “petrified” and “frightening” to describe the prospect of Barrett on the high court. Some of them know Barrett, have mutual friends with her or even have been in her home dozens of times. They describe her as “nice” or “a kind person,” but told the AP they feared others would suffer if Barrett tries to implement People of Praise’s views on homosexuality on the Supreme Court.
About half of the people asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation against themselves or their families from other members of People of Praise, or because they had not come out to everyone in their lives. Among those interviewed were people who attended all three of its schools and who had been active in several of its 22 branches. Their experiences stretched back as far as the 1970s, and as recently as 2020.
NOT WELCOME
Tom Henry was a senior at Trinity School in Eagan, Minnesota, serving as a student ambassador, providing tours to prospective families, when Barrett was an active member of the board.
In early 2017, a lesbian parent asked him whether Trinity was open to gay people and expressed concern about how her child would be treated.
Henry, who is gay, said he didn’t know what to say. He had been instructed not to answer questions about People of Praise or Trinity’s “politics.”
The next day, Henry recalled, he asked the school’s then-headmaster, Jon Balsbaugh, how he should have answered. Henry said Balsbaugh pulled a document out of his desk drawer that condemned gay marriage, and explained it was a new policy from People of Praise that was going into the handbook.
“He looked me right in the eye and said, the next time that happens, you tell them they would not be welcome here,” Henry recounted. “And he said to me that trans families, gay families, gay students, trans students would not feel welcome at Trinity Schools. And then he said, ‘Do we understand each other?’ And I said, yes. And I left. And then I quit the student ambassadors that day.”
Balsbaugh, who has since been promoted to president of Trinity Schools Inc., says his recollection of the conversation “differs considerably,” but declined Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, October 19, 2020
With the nomination and practical acceptance of Amy Coney Barrett being ramrodded through roughshod by the Republicans, it’s almost a practical assurance that the Judge from the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will fill the seat vacated by the recent death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
So if she’s approved to be a Justice on the Supreme Court, it will have been done in less time than it took for her original nomination to be confirmed to the Federal judiciary – 5 months 24 days, versus 3 weeks 3 days/24 calendar days (to date), and counting.
Amy Coney Barrett at investiture to the Federal bench, the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Proceeding therefrom, it now appears that the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) will no longer be tilting at windmills, but instead, will be significantly tilting toward the far right side of the political spectrum – the right-wing nut job side.
So, given that Judge Barrett, whom for one year clerked for late Justice Antonin Scalia, well-known for his interpretive style on the court – which he called “originalism,” and “textualism” – we can expect more nonsensical rulings in the 40+ years to come, the time for which she could reasonably be expected to rule.
Just like Neil Gorsuch’s infamous “Frozen Trucker” case.
And just so you’ll know – not that you would know – there’s a rather telling, and disturbing side of Judge A.C. Barrett’s judicial perspective, and interpretive style.
Case in point to illustrate: Kanter v Barr – a case in which she dissented involving a man who pleaded guilty to one count of a Federal Felony – mail fraud involving Medicare.
In the court’s ruling – an “en banc” decision, involving three judges – they wrote that: Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, October 18, 2020
Trump’s economy is SO BAD…
How bad is it?
Trump’s economy is so bad, that he has LOST MORE than was gained under his administration.
When he took the Oath of Office in January 2017, POS45 was given a THRIVING economy by his predecessor, the Black Democratic President (that’s GOT to gall POS45, don’t you know!?!) Barack Hussein Obama.
Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED) from the St. Louis Federal Reserve, presented graphically data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis about our national economy.
And, just for funsies, and perspective, data from the First Quarter 2005 until Current – 2nd Quarter 2020 is shown.
And as you can see plainly, the last time the economy was performing at this level, was in the 1st Quarter 2015 – over 5 years ago.
5ive years.
That would be the next-to-last year of President Obama’s 2nd term.
Yeah.
Trump has
SQUANDERED AWAY EVERYTHING,
AND THEN SOME!
Kinda’ sounds like a Bible parable, or some such thing.
Isn’t that what he’s done historically with his casinos and their 6 associated Chapter 11 bankruptcies?
But look also at this: The sudden precipitous decline, the rapidly massive downturn in Trump’s economy is the WORST – THE WORST (he likes superlatives) – since records began being kept in 1947. Maybe even worse than the Great Depression.
But look also at this: The sudden precipitous decline, the rapidly massive downturn in Trump’s economy is the WORST – THE WORST (he likes superlatives) – since records have been kept in 1947. Maybe even worse than the Great Depression.
Trump’s economy is now at the point
where Obama’s economy was
in the 1st Quarter 2015.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Saturday, October 17, 2020
Scottie Alton Johnson, a 45-year old Alabama resident, and ward of the state’s prison system, died from complications from COVID-19 on August 1, 2020, according to autopsy results.
Records show that on July 31, authorities took him to a hospital nearest the Bullock Correctional Facility which is located in Union Springs, in Bullock County. Though authorities did not specify, Bullock County Hospital at 104 Bullock Drive, Union Springs, Alabama is less than 3 miles straight down the road, West from the prison.
He died August 1.
At the time of his admission to hospital, he was not thought to be infected with the novel coronavirus, and a COVID-19 test conducted upon his admission resulted negative.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, October 16, 2020
Trump Lost.
Joe Biden and ABC were the BIG WINNERS in Thursday night’s “split screen America” debate.
Biden’s Q & A Town Hall meeting Thursday, October 15, 2020 with voters was held in Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center with George Stephanopoulos moderating. Both men, and all attendees were more than adequately distanced for public health reasons.
Meanwhile, Trump’s Town Hall was conducted outdoors at the Perez Art Museum in Miami, and was moderated by NBC’s Savannah Guthrie, a Georgetown Law graduate who was distanced at least 12 feet from the President.
But it turns out NBC was played for a fool by the Manipulator in Chief.
Trump lost.
NBC lost.
After initially rejecting the Commission on Presidential Debates offer to conduct a “virtual” town hall, Trump reached out to NBC to hold the town hall style meeting on the same day and time slot as Joe Biden’s appearance in Philadelphia in a direct head-to-head viewership challenge to feed his fragile ego.
Yashar Ali, a contributor to New York Magazine and HuffPost wrote that several NBC employees were angered, and that “over a dozen NBC, MSNBC, and CNBC sources (talent and staff) and the frustration with and anger toward their employer for scheduling a town hall against Biden is palpable.”
Trump lost.
NBC lost.
NBC News agreed to put Trump before voters in a town hall style event on Thursday, October 15 – the same day as Biden’s scheduled town hall in Philadelphia – stipulating that beforehand, he must have submitted to an independent coronavirus test with the results reviewed by Dr. Anthony Fauci.
NBC said that Trump was administered a coronavirus test Tuesday by the National Institutes of Health, the results of which were reviewed by NIH Clinical Director Dr. Clifford Lane and Dr. Anthony Fauci, both who stated after reviewing the President’s medical records, that they had a high degree of confidence that the president was “not shedding infectious virus.”
But Trump’s COVID-19 test wasn’t the only thing reviewed.
That was the promise which was authorized and made to freed slaves by General Tecumseh Sherman in Special Field Order No. 15 on January 16, 1865, during the last days of the Civil War.
It was promptly broken by President Johnson, who was a slave owner, and had become President upon Lincoln’s assassination.
America has been breaking promises at least since 1776.
I wish that America’s politicians
(especially the GOP)
cared more for The People
than for corporations.
Anyone that loves America, loves her people, loves the idea of liberty, of equality, and guaranteed rights under law, should also love honesty, justice, and responsibility. And one simply CANNOT examine any segment of American history without acknowledging the horrific and grotesque inequity present FROM THE BEGINNING of this nation. It’s written in the Constitution, for heaven’s sake!
Women did not have the right to vote (suffrage).
Blacks were enslaved. Then, Blacks were continually discriminated against in seemingly countless ways – ranging from the denial of voting rights, of commerce, of justice, and more. And, as if to add insult to injury, the 13th Amendment has an exclusion clause FOR the purpose of perpetuating slavery. The amendment reads: Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
“…except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted…”
Yes, slavery IS 100% Legal in the United States. The Constitution says so.
And to ANYONE who claims or asserts that there is not now institutionalized racism in this country need only look to the USDA (United States Department of Agriculture) to see that racism is institutionalized, and alive and well in the United States.
In the 1999 Class Action case Pigford v. Glickman(Timothy Pigford, et al., v. Dan Glickman, Secretary, United States Department of Agriculture), “the suit claimed that the agency had discriminated against black farmers on the basis of race and failed to investigate or properly respond to complaints from 1983 to 1997.” Members of the class included those who received allocation of farm loans and assistance between 1981 and 1996. (See: “Black Farmers Win $1.25 Billion In Discrimination Suit,” By Jasmin Melvin, February 18, 2010, online at https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-farmers-pigford-idUSTRE61H5XD20100218)
• The 2007 Census of Agriculture reported that 2.20 million farms operated in the United States. Of this total, 32,938, or approximately 1.5% of all farms, were operated by African Americans.
• Over 74% (24,466) of African American farmers in the United States reside in Texas, Mississippi, North and South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, Virginia and Louisiana.
• Average annual market value for farms operated by African American farmers in 2007 was $30,829. The national average for white U.S. farmers was $140,521.
• Overall, the number of farms operated in the United States increased by 3.2% between 2002 and 2007. Farms operated by African Americans increased from 29,090 to 32,938, an 11.7% increase over the five-year period.
• In 2007, 348 (757 in 2002) African American farmers received Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC) loans amounting to a total of $9.9 million. This averaged $28,408 per participating African American farmer, about 32% of the national average ($87,917). Average CCC loan value to white farmers was $88,379.
• Other federal farm payments to African American operated farms averaged $4,260, half the national average government farm payment of $9,518. About 31% of all African American farmers received some government payment compared to 50% of white farmers.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, October 2, 2020
🎯BULLSEYE!!🦠☠️
The “October Surprise” is right on time!
Not to worry… a cup of bleach oughta’ clear it right up!🤣 Or some hydroxychloroquine.🏴☠️ Sarcasm purposely intended.
Why does this NOT surprise anyone – not even one iota?
When it comes to the matter of the eventuality of his infection, for quite some time numerous individuals have maintained that “the booms are getting closer,” a colloquialism meaning that sooner, or later, the “booms” will find their target.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, September 24, 2020
What the police did in Louisville, KY is CRIMINAL, and INEXCUSABLE.
PERIOD.
That her murderers/killers were NOT indicted is a indictment itself upon the INJUSTICE system in that town.
This is where vigilante justice comes in handy begins to enter the picture.
Right-Wing Extremists and GOPers are doing it (look at Wisconsin), and now, turn about’s fair play.
They’re permanently marked men – with the “mark of Cain.”
But unlike Cain, look for them to be Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, September 22, 2020
America has problems – 330,337,600 problems, to be exact.
That’s how many people – at least – are resident in the United States as of Tuesday, September 22, 2020.
Previously, there were 330,326,679 people in the USA yesterday.
PROBLEM: The House of Representatives is TOO SMALL.
FACTS: Following the 1910 Census, with the Apportionment Act of 1911, Congress set the number of Members in the House of Representatives at 435, to become effective March 1913. The 1910 Census found 92,228,496 people in our United States, so at that time, the ratio of Residents per Representative was 212,020 to 1. The ratio is now 759,396 to 1. If you feel like you’re not being represented in Congress… guess what? You’re NOT.
“Dog whistle is a type of strategy of communication that sends a message that the general population will take a certain meaning from, but a certain group that is “in the know” will take away the secret, intended message. Often involves code words.
“Republicans say they want to make civil rights for gays a state issue, which is really just a dog whistle strategy for saying that they will refuse to grant equal rights on a federal level.”
Trump To White Minnesota Audience:
“You Have Good Genes.”
by Christopher Wilson – Senior Writer, Yahoo News
September 21, 2020
It’s called a “dog whistle,” a word or phrase in a speech that is unobjectionable on the surface but conveys a coded message to partisans, by analogy to high-pitched sounds that are audible to dogs but not to people. Richard Nixon leaned on it heavily during his 1968 presidential campaign, referencing “law and order” and a “war on drugs,” further codifying racial appeals from Barry Goldwater for “states’ rights” and “freedom of association.” Ronald Reagan took it to another level in 1976, demonizing a “welfare queen” who fraudulently collected $150,000 in government benefits, a barely concealed appeal to the race and class resentments of White voters toward Blacks.
Ed. NOTE: Reagan’s demagogic demonization of an ostensibly Black woman as a “welfare queen” is a highly-popularized modern-day Republican myth. Linda Taylor, a Tennessee-born White Chicago-area resident, was given the miscreant moniker by the Chicago Tribune in October 1974, which also focused upon her personal possessions – jewelry, furs, and a Cadillac – though the real story of her behavior was much worse, and more complicated than a relatively minor case of simple welfare fraud. In 2013, Josh Levin, Editorial Director for Slate, wrote an extensively detailed report of the real-life character who Reagan mythologized on his campaign trail, exclusively in an effort to capitalize upon the “shock and awe” factor to gain voter support for his candidacy. Reagan’s use of exaggeration as a raconteur was renown, and in a January 1976 campaign rally, as any good story-teller would, he embellished that character by claiming, “In Chicago, they found a woman who holds the record. She used 80 names, 30 addresses, 15 telephone numbers to collect food stamps, Social Security, veterans’ benefits for four nonexistent deceased veteran husbands, as well as welfare. Her tax-free cash income alone has been running $150,000 a year.” While much has been written about Reagan’s well-known penchant for demagoguery, little of what he claimed was true, though he made significant political hay with it by portraying one isolated problem as a wholesale representation of systemic organizational failure, which he later used to justify reducing spending on social welfare programs. While Taylor did go to prison for committing about $8000 in welfare fraud (the 2020 value of which would be about $36,500), she was more memorable for her theft-claim and bigamy scams, which frauds were discovered only years later, along with probable murder and kidnapping for which she was never indicted. Levin wrote, “For Linda Taylor, people were consumable goods, objects to cultivate, manipulate, and discard. For Ronald Reagan, Taylor was a tool to convince voters that the government was in crisis.”
By that standard, President Trump’s riff about the “good genes” found among the people of Minnesota — an 80 percent white state — wasn’t a dog whistle. It was a train whistle, folding in Trump’s long-held belief that some people, himself especially, are simply born with superior traits to others.
“You have good genes, you know that, right?” Trump said during his Saturday rally in front of a nearly all-white crowd in Bemidji. “You have good genes. A lot of it is about the genes, isn’t it, don’t you believe? The racehorse theory. You think we’re so different? You have good genes in Minnesota.”
The racehorse theory is the belief that some humans have a better genetic endowment than others, and by breeding two superior people you end up with superior offspring. The belief in eugenics, the pseudoscience of trimming out “inferior” bloodlines to increase the quality of the gene pool, is part of a long, racist history in America, from forced sterilizations to research funded by the Carnegie Institution, among other wealthy foundations. Earlier this month, charges surfaced that a doctor at an ICE facility was performing unwanted and likely unnecessary hysterectomies on detained immigrant women, which would prevent them from having more children.
“It’s not just eugenics in theory, but it’s eugenics in practice,” said Steve Silberman, a historian whose Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, September 20, 2020
199,474 – TOTAL U.S.A. COVID-19 Deaths
197,544 – TOTAL number of casualties – deaths, injuries, POWs, MIAs – from the Top Ten Major Civil War Battles of:
Gettyburg Chickamauga Spotsylvania Courthouse Shiloh Stones River Antietam First Battle of Bull Run Second Battle of Bull Run Fredricksburg Cold Harbor
Civil War Battlefield Deaths – 204,100
Only 4,626 to go.
196,103 deaths on 9/16/20.
199,474 deaths on 9/20/20.
That’s an average of 843/day.
At that rate, we’ll surpass that figure in 5.48 days – by September 26.
At the current rate, Trumpvirus Deaths will ECLIPSE Civil War Battlefield Deaths
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, September 20, 2020
South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham is a hypocrite, and a liar… just like his narcissistic miscreant misleader, Donald “DJ” Trump, aka POS45.
In comments lasting about 6 minutes on March 10, 2016, before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Graham said in pertinent part,
“I want you to use my words against me:
If there’s a Republican president in 2016,
and a vacancy occurs in the last year of the first term,
you can say ‘Lindsey Graham said,
‘Let’s let the next President,
whoever it might be,
make that nomination,”
and you could use my words against me,
and you’d be absolutely right.”
– South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, to the Senate Judiciary Committee March, 10, 2016
On Wednesday, October 3, 2018 in an interview with Jeffrey Goldberg, Editor in Chief of The Atlantic, at The Atlantic Festival in Washington, D.C., Graham said in pertinent part that,
Here’s an excerpt of the pertinent part of that interview which has become part of an ad exposing Graham’s lying hypocrisy, and opposing his re-election.
Things are different now, and that instead, he will support the President’s nominee.
Here’s a recent Tweet published by him Saturday, 19 September 2020 of him attempting to explain away his twice former promises and position to adhere to his promise of not promoting a SCOTUS nominee during an election season.
As to my view of filling a Supreme Court vacancy in 2020, I’d encourage you to review these most recent statements.
And that’s but one reason why the GOP will lose the Senate, gain the White House, and strengthen their hold on the House of Representatives.
Sen. Graham’s challenge: Fill a court seat and save his own
By Meg Kinnard
Sunday, 20 September 2020
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Few members of the Republican Party have taken a political journey as long as Lindsey Graham’s, from ridiculing Donald Trump as a “race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot” to becoming one of the president’s fiercest defenders in Congress, as well as a regular golf partner.
Graham has long been known to have flexible politics, and that has served him well in South Carolina for decades. But this November may be his toughest test yet as he seeks reelection and explains to voters how, as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, he will push for Trump’s Supreme Court nominee on the president’s aggressive timetable, when the senator was so clearly — even defiantly — opposed to that approach as recently as two years ago, even demanding that he be called out for hypocrisy if he switched.
He switched.
“The rules have changed as far as I’m concerned,” Graham said Saturday.
It falls to Graham, as committee chairman, to vet Trump’s pick to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Read the rest of this entry »
The so-called “McConnell Rule,” which was actually no rule at all, but a political ploy by the Republican Senate Majority Leader from Kentucky, should be considered.
After all, turn about it fair play, and paybacks are hell.
But, before we continue in detail, NPR, which first reported the story of Justice Ginsburg’s death, wrote this:
“Just days before her death,
as her strength waned,
Ginsburg dictated this statement to her granddaughter Clara Spera:
“My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed.”
Justice Ginsburg was referring to comments that McConnell made following the unexpected death of SCOTUS Justice Antonin Scalia, while on a hunting trip in Texas on February 13, 2016.
And I mean to refer specifically to those comments.
Scalia’s body wasn’t even proverbially cold yet, and preparations for disposition of his mortal remains, and burial hadn’t even begun to be made, and the noxious Senator from Kentucky was already shooting off his mouth. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Wednesday, September 16, 2020
The mythical Trump voter, the ones who don’t regularly show up to vote at elections, are often cited as the ones who helped put Trump over the top in the 2016 General Election.
Also sometimes also called “secret,” “hidden” or “shy” Trump voters,” they’re often identified demographically as being White, largely middle-to-lower class, with only a high school education, or less.
Before the November 2016 General Election, in March that same year, the Pew Research Center did some investigation on such a matter – the occasional voters, sometimes also known as those individuals who say they voted, but didn’t – long before it was “a thing.” Here’s what they found: “16% of those who say they “definitely voted” in the 2014 midterm election have no record of voting in commercially available national voter files.”
Their work was definitely cut out for them, because as they acknowledged, “while the presence of a record of voting almost certainly means that a person voted, the absence of a record doesn’t necessarily mean they did not.” In other words, a person could be registered to vote, but for one reason or another, they may not have exercised their right to vote, or, a record of their participation in the election is not available. In election parlance, that’s called a voting mismatch – the uncertainty of knowing whether someone registered to vote did, or did not vote.
“Respondents who say they turned out to vote in a particular election is often far greater than the proportion of the population who turned out according to official turnout tallies,” and “one-size-does-not-fit-all when it comes to the best way to validate registration and turnout across U.S. states.”
Photo of the Chickamauga Battlefield from the Mathew Brady Photographs series, The Battle of Chickamauga, September 19 – 20, 1863, National Achives; https://catalog.archives.gov/id/524418 Confederate General Braxton Bragg’s Army of the Tennessee defeated forces from the Union’s Army of the Cumberland under Major General William Rosecrans in the Battle of Chickamauga in Georgia on September 19-20, 1863. However, Rosecrans’ forces were able to slip away to Chattanooga, and later relieved by forces under Ulysses S. Grant.
Worse than the Battle of Chickamauga, with 34,000 casualties in the Civil War in 1863.
And even much worse than the Battle of Gettysburg, with 51,000 casualties in 3 days of fighting.
And the Iraq War, with only 4576 deaths is but a mere pittance.
And the War in Afghanistan, where 2216 lives were lost, is exceedingly eclipsed.
• FIVE major Civil War Battles
• A Notorious World War II war crime
• Two modern wars
ALL COMBINED, it’s only 191,792.
And Trump has beat ’em all.
That’s because he always does the most in everything he’s ever done – so he says.
196,103.
That’s the cumulative total number of COVID-19 related deaths in the United States, as reported by Johns Hopkins University, as of 1023, Wednesday, 16 September 2020 .
3000.
That’s the number of people who died in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center twin towers, and the Pentagon.
6436.76% more have died under Trump’s watch,
than under Bush’s.
And only 16,832 more to go before we eclipse the total deaths in World War I (116,516), Vietnam War (58,209), and Korean War (36,574) combined – 211,299.
Here’s another number:
197,544.
The TOTAL number of casualties – deaths, injuries, POWs, MIAs – from the Top Ten Major Civil War Battles of:
Gettyburg Chickamauga Spotsylvania Courthouse Shiloh Stones River Antietam First Battle of Bull Run Second Battle of Bull Run Fredricksburg Cold Harbor
196,103 is today’s Trump Death Count – Wednesday, 16 September 2020,
as of the 1023 update.
Only 1441 to go.
The next macabre marker for the Trump virus is Civil War Battlefield Deaths – 204,100.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, September 15, 2020
Not to worry.
It’s just another episode of the Trump Surreality Show.
You haven’t missed anything.
“We say enough to our conflict, after years of not fighting each other, finally we’ll bring calm to Dubai’s surrounding areas,” the Netanyahu character sarcastically begins.
The opening line derided the fact that the so-called “peace deal” was in fact between two countries who had never been at war.
“Unlike Begin, I didn’t compromise on anything,” the Israeli figure continues, referring to former Prime Minister Menachem Begin signing a peace treaty with Egyptian president Anwar Sadat in 1979.
If you really want to know what people think about their politics, and (mis)leaders, look at their humor.
So, here’s what Israelis think about the not-really-a-peace deal the Carnival Barker in Chief manipulated today.
SIOUX FALLS, SD – The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has cited Smithfield Packaged Meats Corp. in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, for failing to protect employees from exposure to the coronavirus. OSHA proposed a penalty of $13,494, the maximum allowed by law.
Agency: Occupational Safety & Health Administration Date: September 10, 2020 Release Number: 20-1684-NAT
With a paltry, even laughable, mere $13,494 on the line, it’s not even a good slap on the wrist. They make that in a fraction of a second of business operations.
Remember: Smithfield Foods has NOT BEEN an American company since selling out to the Chinese in 2013. Good old fashioned Corporate American Wall $treet greed sold out America and Smithfield to China.
Wan Long, RIGHT, Chairman and CEO of WH Group, formerly called Shuanghui International, shakes hands with Charles Larry Pope, President and CEO of Smithfield Foods, at a press conference of WH Group in Hong Kong, China, 14 April 2014. Two subsidiaries of Henan Shuanghui Investment and Development Co have gained access to the Russian market, after its parent company — WH Group Ltd, the world’s largest pork producer— acquired US pork producer Smithfield Foods Inc and bought a stake in Campofrio Food Group SA of Spain, the largest pan-European packaged meat products company, last year. The two Heilongjiang-based companies — Wangkui Shuanghui Beidahuang Food Co and Heilongjiang Baoquanling Shuanghui Food Industry Co — got the official nod after their production facilities and products were examined and assessed by officials from Russia’s meat products watchdog, the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance, in August, Shuanghui Development said on its website. To widen its import market for meat, the Russian government agreed to import meat products from five Chinese suppliers by the end of August, indicating the nation has taken a flexible strategy to balance the supply and demand relationship, while the US and its European allies are trying to squeeze the country’s trade space in the world market.
And the corporate masters are STILL selling out the people. Just read their laughable response later down. They’re actually protesting the poor token of a penalty.
Seriously. They are!
Even the right-tilting tabloid New York Daily News owned by Rupert Murdoch, has written about the fractional pittance which has been assessed upon the corporation by the OSHA.
By Joseph Wilkinson, New York Daily News, September 12, 2020 at 10:12 PM
And Congress has the power to act. However, with Moscow Mitch misleading the Senate, there’ll nothing be done about anything the House sends to that traitorous rich bastard.
WH Group, formerly known as Shuanghui International, bought the venerable American company known for their hams since its 1936 inception in Smithfield, Virginia, for $4.7 billion in 2013. In fact, it was the region’s Native Americans who taught the Paleface settlers to the area the unique curing process they’d created well over 500 years ago, and which increased in popularity as time went on.
More than anything, it looks like the Loser in Chief is in cahoots with the Chinese.
I mean, after all, if he’s as big and bad on them as he claims to be, this fine would be 100x time amount to start with.
Yes, that’d be USD$1,349,400.
It’s HIGH TIME for a 75/25 rule of law!
Simply put, it goes like this:
75% of any businesses’ ownership MUST be American to enjoy a 25% corporate tax rate.
Presently, the Federal Corporate Tax Tate is set at 21%. Before the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (the so-called “Trump tax cuts” which, true to course, benefited only the wealthy), the tax rate was 35%. I have little doubt that the law will be repealed, thus increasing the corporate tax rate.
There MUST be a punishment exacted, and penalty paid for corporations which despitefully exploit their domestic American existence!
What’s more, Congress could, and should, also enact a 60/40 rule of law, which, again, simply stated, is that for companies which are employee-owned, they must be at least 60% owned by employees – either direct, indirect (trust), or hybrid – in order to enjoy certain additional tax benefits not available to other corporate-owned businesses. By so doing, it would encourage employee ownership of businesses.
Corporate alienation and isolation from the day-to-day lives of their employees and the Average American is highly problematic, and such a rule would go a long way toward readjusting in a positive manner the lopsided and skewed income and wealth gap in the United States.
“Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), one of the most conservative members of Congress, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), one of the most liberal, have both introduced sweeping proposals to broaden employee ownership in the U.S. That surprising fact testifies to just how practical—and urgent—this idea is.”
Mr. Rosen also pointed to 2019 research by Rutgers University which found in part, that “employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs) enable families to significantly increase their assets, shrinking—though not eliminating—gender and racial wealth gaps,” and wrote that “ESOP companies helped employees gain a better understanding not just of corporate financial issues—most ESOPs have some form of open book management—but also personal financial planning. Many companies offered employees an increased voice in how their work was organized, providing a level of personal agency lacking in most jobs.”
OSHA fines Smithfield Foods $13,494 for not protecting South Dakota workers from COVID-19, faces backlash from company and workers – Agweek
Written By: Jeremy Fugleberg
Sep 10th 2020 – 1pm.
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. — The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration has fined Smithfield Foods $13,494 for failing to protect employees at its Sioux Falls meatpacking plant from exposure to COVID-19, OSHA announced Thursday, Sept. 10, and both the company and the union that represents plant works are objecting to the decision.
The workplace safety agency said the Smithfield fine was the maximum allowed by law for the single violation it found at the plant, which for a time was one of the largest COVID-19 hotspots in the nation. OSHA cited the company for one violation of failing to provide a workplace free from recognized hazards that can cause death or serious harm.
A COVID-19 outbreak at the plant in March and April sickened 1,294 employees and killed four, OSHA said. It also sickened hundreds of family members and other close contacts to workers.
“Employers must quickly implement appropriate measures to protect their workers’ safety and health,” OSHA Sioux Falls Area Director Sheila Stanley said in a news release. “Employers must meet their obligations and take the necessary actions to prevent the spread of coronavirus at their worksite.”
The OSHA fine is “wholly without merit” and Smithfield Foods will contest it, said Keira Lombardo, the Virginia-based company’s executive vice president of corporate affairs and compliance. Read the rest of this entry »
Many people have used the word “fascist” to describe Donald Trump over the past few years. I was not one of them—until Monday night, when Trump openly defended and endorsed violence by his supporters.
First, Trump shockingly defended his 17-year-old supporter Kyle Rittenhouse, who drove across state lines into Wisconsin where he illegally carried a weapon in the streets of Kenosha and then shot and killed two people. (Criminal charges filed against Rittenhouse include first-degree intentional homicide and illegal possession of a deadly weapon.)
Then Trump backed his supporters who on Saturday descended in a caravan of cars on Portland, Oregon, where they were seen shooting projectiles such as paintballs and pepper spray at people in the street. Trump defended this criminal conduct as a “peaceful protest,” arguing that “paint is not bullets.” In reality, shooting people with paintballs is a crime—we all know that. It could blind a person or worse. Yet Trump defends it because the people engaged in this violence were on Team Trump.
We have now entered a new reality in America where Trump, like fascists before, is embracing violence to remain in power. Let’s be clear about what fascism is. As Madeleine Albright explained while discussing her 2018 book, Fascism: A Warning,
“Fascism is not an ideology; it’s a process for taking and holding power.”
She added that “what differentiates fascism from other ideological movements is the use of violence and anger to achieve political ends.” Hammering that point home, Albright back in early 2019 used a line that sums up Trump today:
“Fascism involves the endorsement and use of violence to achieve political goals and stay in power.”
While Trump has embraced other methods used by fascists before—such as pitting Americans against one another to incite anger—that has been Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, September 10, 2020
Do you ever read a headline, and then desperately wade through the gobbledygook mumbo-jumbo to find the gem, or answer to the question posed very near the end of the article?
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, September 10, 2020
History is sometimes unimaginably ugly.
Especially when it concerns slavery.
By reading this, perhaps you can gain a greater understanding of how this abusive practice was effectively translated into vigilantism, and lynch mobs.
Perhaps as well, it’s easy to see the roots of the modern practice of “stop and frisk” which was used widely in New York City, most notably under then-Mayor Mike Bloomberg, then a Republican, and other such stops and detainments simply because of the individual’s skin color, or ethnicity.
Beginning in 1757 Georgia’s colonial assembly required white landowners and residents to serve as slave patrols.
Asserting that slave insurrections must be prevented, the legislature stipulated in “An Act for Establishing and Regulating of Patrols” that groups “not exceeding seven” would work in districts twelve miles square. The statute, modeled on South Carolina’s earlier patrol law, ordered white adults to ride the roads at night, stopping all slaves they encountered and making them prove that they were engaged in lawful activities. Patrollers required slaves to produce a pass, which stated their owner’s name as well as where and when they were allowed to be away from the plantation and for how long. Patrols operated in Georgia until slavery was abolished at the end of the Civil War (1861-65).
A Georgia statute ordered White adults to ride the roads at night, stopping all slaves they encountered and making them prove that they were engaged in lawful activities. Patrollers required slaves to produce a pass, which stated their owner’s name as well as where and when they were allowed to be away from the plantation and for how long. From The Underground Railroad, by William Still
Whites could hire substitutes to patrol for them; absentees were fined. Much of the burden of patrol duty fell to non-slaveholders, who often resented what they sometimes saw as service to the planter class. The Chatham County grand jury complained in the mid-1790s about the difficulty it faced in enforcing the patrol requirement. By the early nineteenth century it became necessary to pay people to perform what had been voluntary unpaid service. In 1819 Savannah‘s city watch received one dollar for every evening they served and shared in any reward for the forced return of fugitive slaves.
To disperse any nighttime meetings, patrollers visited places where slaves often gathered. Owners feared such gatherings allowed slaves to trade stolen goods for liquor and other forbidden items.
River patrols were organized in Savannah and Augusta to combat “midnight depredations” and to
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Saturday, September 5, 2020
GOP candidate wanna-be for the Presidential nomination, Donald Trump at Ames, Iowa Family Leadership Summit, Saturday, July 18, 2015.
At this point, that’s the only question remaining.
America, what further evidence do you need in order to kick Liar in Chief, Asshole in Chief, POS45 Donald John Trump to the curb?
Why in the hell did you ever elect such a low-life scumbag in the first place?!?
Seriously.
Why?
Whose lies did you believe – his, or Jerry Falwell, Jr.’s?
Or both?
Recently (Friday, September 4, 2020), Jeffrey Goldberg, Editor in Chief of The Atlantic, quoted at least 4 separate unnamed military sources who were present in 2018 when Trump, as POTUS said of his decision not to attend a memorial ceremony in Aisne-Marne American Cemetery near Paris in 2018,
“Why should I go to that cemetery?
It’s filled with losers.”
Read Jeff Goldberg’s article in The Atlantic. How could anyone support Trump? pic.twitter.com/xqfnklmCBq
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Wednesday, September 2, 2020
To which I say,
GOOD!
It’s about damn time!
Joe Kennedy III, who is the 40-year old grandson of slain Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, challenged incumbent Ed Markey for the state’s upcoming U.S. Senate seat in the Democratic primary.
Kennedy lost.
It was a landmark, a high water mark, an event of immensely significant importance.
Perhaps it even intoned cataclysmic changes ahead.
Good ones, of course.
Just like “good trouble.”
The Boston Globe characterized Kennedy’s campaign style as an “increasingly bare-knuckled offensive,” while the headlines across the world were interesting… if not telling.
Let’s examine a few of the headlines from throughout the nation, and then, we’ll move along to WHY it’s a good thing that not-so-poor little Joe P. Kennedy III lost.
Here’s also a wee bit of background to aid understanding.
Joseph Patrick Kennedy, Sr. (wearing glasses) family portrait
The Kennedy name, of course, is renown in American politics. And for perspective, Joe P. III is the grandson of the slain Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy (1925-1968). And Joe P. III is named for the family progenitor, Joseph Patrick Kennedy (1888-1969) – long rumored by numerous sources to have been a bootlegger during Prohibition, which, if the sources were lying, and the claim not true, would question their motives, since the senior Kennedy has long been dead.
“If America had an aristocracy, the most titled bloodline would certainly be the Kennedys. In the past half century, one Kennedy after another has occupied nearly every political position America has to offer, including the roles of congressman, senator, ambassador, mayor, SEC chairman, state representative, city councilman, and, of course, President.
“The sustaining force behind the Kennedys reign is hardly a secret. Thanks to Joseph P. Kennedy, who made a fortune from insider trading only to later chair the SEC, the family is fabulously rich. But exactly how much is America’s first family worth? Forbes pegs the extended family’s fortune at $1 billion.
“Protected by a labyrinth of trusts, as well as tax strategies that would make Joseph P. Kennedy proud, the Kennedy fortune now spans approximately 30 family members, and includes the surnames Shriver, Lawford and the Smith. At nearly $175 million as of 2013, Caroline Kennedy is the richest descendant by far, but more modestly endowed relatives, such as Robert Shriver, who is running for Los Angeles County Supervisor, still possess assets in the tens of millions, according to public financial disclosures required of government officials.
“The bulk of the family’s wealth is held in dozens of trusts, which range in value from tens of thousands to as much as $25 million. Nearly all are managed by Joseph P. Kennedy Enterprises, a family office located in New York City with assets dating back to 1927, according to Christopher Kennedy, a member of the Kennedy family who sits on the office’s board.
“Joseph P. Kennedy’s choice to place his fortune in trusts is possibly the single most critical reason why the family wealth is still around today. The most obvious benefit was to protect the fortune from the prying fingers of ne’er-do-well heirs, said Laurence Leamer, who wrote three Kennedy biographies. Trusts often prevent beneficiaries from tapping more than 10 percent of principal, said Rick Kruse, principal at Kruse and Crawford, which offers estate management advice.
“The trusts also protect the family assets from another set of prying fingers: Uncle Sam’s. By holding assets in so called “dynasty trusts,” which are passed from heir to heir for decades, if not longer, the Kennedy family fortune is largely insulated from the estate tax, Kruse said. Handled correctly, a dynasty trust could potentially maintain an un-taxable fortune indefinitely. The oldest Kennedy trust on record dates back to 1936.
“Like politics, tax savvy seems to run in the Kennedy family. The most recent example is Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, August 31, 2020
Predictions sometimes come true.
And paybacks aren’t always hell.
The NY Times and other news agencies are reporting that Liberty University is in the process of a forensic audit to examine the school’s operations during Jerry Falwell, Jr.’s tenure as its President.
You had to have known (i.e., strongly suspected) that it would happen.
Falwell, Jr. is a real estate attorney-developer whose father, the late Rev. Jerry Falwell, Sr. founded the school, and was founding pastor of Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia. As well, he founded the long-defunct “Moral Majority” – a right-wing Christian religious political action group which was extensively involved in Republican politics, and was predominately concerned with social and cultural matters, and vehemently opposed Civil Rights for anyone but heterosexuals.
Others in the same era include James Dobson, a psychologist and founder of “Focus on the Family” who frequently pointed to Judeo-Christian holy writ to support his theories, the Rev. Don Wildmon, a United Methodist pastor and founder of the Tupelo, Mississippi-based American Family Association, and the American Family Radio network which began as Low-Power FM stations in small communities and neighborhoods throughout the nation, and numerous other predominately White Protestant religious figures, including many in the so-called “blab-it-and-grab-it” heterodox pseudo-faith movement also known as the “prosperity gospel” preachers such as Kenneth Copeland, Benny Hinn, Robert Tilton, Jerry Savelle, Marilyn Hickey, Kenneth Hagin, Sr., T.L. and Daisy Osborne, and John and “Dodie” Osteen, whose son Joel, with his wife, now occupies their former positions in the church they founded.
Perhaps now you can better understand the basis for some, if not much, of the shenanigans with the Republican party’s fawning obeisance to Evangelicals. Simply put, it’s payback, because they put them in power. You’ll see that theme emerge again, later in the article.
But back to the matter at hand.
And that is concerning Jerry Falwell, Jr.’s tenure as Liberty University President and Chancellor.
NOTE: For sake of simplicity, and ease of understanding, the junior Falwell will be referred to simply as “Jerry Falwell,” except for instances in which it is pertinent to mention his father, the late “Rev. Jerry Falwell, Sr.”
As an experienced political analyst, Mr. Singleton’s bona fides are impressive, and includes addressing Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, contributing to several broadcast and news media outlets including The New York Times, C-SPAN, The Washington Post, CNBC, The Hill, CNN, MSNBC, and The Washington Times magazine, among others.
Mr. Singleton, who was born in Louisiana, spent his formative years in Dallas, Texas, earned his Bachelor’s degree from Morehouse College in Political Science, and before that, the Associate in Arts & Science from Southern New Hampshire University.
Having spent time with the organization Lauren’s Kids, a south Florida-based non-profit which works to eradicate sexual abuse through educating adults and school-age children, he later worked as a Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, August 30, 2020
Selma-to-Montgomery Civil Rights march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, Selma, AL, on “Bloody Sunday,” March 7, 1965
By now, if you pay any attention to any news from anywhere – radio, teevee, Internet, etc. – you’ve heard the disheartening news of a 17-year-old young man from Antioch, Illinois who has been accused of shooting and killing 2 individuals who were apparently no threat to him, and seriously wounding a third – 26-year old Gaige Grosskreutz – in Kenosha, Wisconsin.
There are numerous videos of Kyle Rittenhouse, seen throughout the events wearing a green short-sleeved tee-shirt, sporting a baseball-style cap turned backwards, and brandishing an AR-15 type assault rifle as he cavorted in the streets of Kenosha concurrent with the events unfolding after law enforcement authorities there shot Jacob Blake 7 times in the back at arm’s length range.
U.S. Representative John Lewis (1940-2020) (D-GA,5) stands in front of the Edmund Pettus Bridge, Selma, Alabama – a pivotal site for the Civil Rights Movement.
Jacob Blake was an apparently unarmed 29-year old Black man, and father of three young children, aged 8, 5, and 3, who sat in the car and watched the tragedy unfold, as their father was Tazed, then shot 7 times in the back with a pistol – paralyzed from the waist down as a consequence – by a 7-year veteran law enforcement Officer Rusten Sheskey, a White man.
Young Mr. Rittenhouse, who will be tried as an adult under Wisconsin state law, is described as Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, August 28, 2020
All matters of politics, policy and governance aside, yes, aside, what this matter speaks to is the lack of authenticity and lack of veracity of polling techniques. And mathematically, that is problematic.
Oh, perhaps you’re not interested in math, you may say.
“He told me that they fundamentally undercounted the Trump vote;
that the Trump voter is not a voter in every single election,
that they come out for Trump,
so they’re hard to count.”
Roaches come out when you turn off the light.
Turn it on and they scatter.
Very well, then… move along, move along – there’s nothing here to see.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, August 24, 2020
Well, well, well…
Since 2012 America’s Evangelical Protestant religious power couple, Jerry Falwell, Jr. and his wife Becki, have been sexually playing with the pool boy, with whom they later partnered in business – as well as monkey business.
In the parlance of sexual play, watching while another man has sex with your wife/partner, is called “cuckolding.”
Frankly, this event – in, and of itself – is no big deal, per se, and is certainly nothing new. By that, I mean that everybody involved was in agreement, and as Evangelicals often flout, there’s power in agreement. And frankly, no one was harmed, and everyone agreed to it. Furthermore, no criminal or civil laws were broken.
What was broken, however, was Jerry Falwell, Jr.’s trust with the private religious university he led, the general public, his followers, and those within his religious circle.
In common parlance, that’s called betrayal, and hypocrisy.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – In a claim likely to intensify the controversy surrounding one of the most influential figures in the American Christian conservative movement, a business partner of Jerry Falwell Jr has come forward to say he had a years-long sexual relationship involving Falwell’s wife and the evangelical leader.
Giancarlo Granda says he was 20 when he met Jerry and Becki Falwell while working as a pool attendant at the Fontainebleau Miami Beach hotel in March 2012. Starting that month and continuing into 2018, Granda told Reuters that the relationship involved him having sex with Becki Falwell while Jerry Falwell looked on.
Granda showed Reuters emails, text messages and other evidence that he says demonstrate the sexual nature of his relationship with the couple, who have been married since 1987. “Becki and I developed an intimate relationship and Jerry enjoyed watching from the corner of the room,” Granda said in an interview. Now 29, he described the liaisons as frequent – “multiple times per year” – and said the encounters took place at hotels in Miami and New York, and at the Falwells’ home in Virginia.
His friendship with the Falwells eventually soured, Granda told Reuters, in part because he wanted to dissolve his ties with the couple and fell into a business dispute with them.
Giancarlo Granda, who was befriended by Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr and his wife Rebecca while he was working as a pool attendant at a luxury Miami Beach hotel and was later backed by them in a business venture involving a youth hostel, poses for a portrait in Washington, U.S., August 10, 2020. To match Special Report USA-FALWELL/RELATIONSHIP REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
Granda first emerged as a figure in the Falwells’ circle two years ago, when BuzzFeed News reported that the couple had befriended Granda and gone into business with him, buying a Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, August 24, 2020
A friend seeking my opinion had sent to me an anonymous post which I rather suspect is “making the rounds” on social media, which most likely is FaceBook. The following is my reply.
NOTE TO THE READER: For ease of reading, and for convenience sake, the anonymous author’s remarks are found in red, and my response is found [emboldened in black within brackets].
—//—
I did not write this but it’s exactly what i’ve been questioning. This is what i want answers too. We need to push “leaders” to give answers and make decisions that make sense long term. When does quality of life out weights the risk of a disease you have a 99.97% of getting?
Thank you to whoever wrote this.
******
What is the end game with the ‘rona? Anyone? 🦠
[NOTE: The basis for the practical entirely of the argument made in the author’s “rant” is hopelessness, helplessness, quitting in exasperation, and not even trying.]
What is the magic formula that is going to allow us to sound the “all clear?” [There is NO “magic formula.”]Is it zero cases? For a while, the goal was to simply “flatten the curve,” but now that we are disconnecting utilities for gatherings in California, setting up check points in New York, and recommending goggles (what’s next?), it seems as if there is, in fact, no end game. And, truthfully, the only way that we will see numbers drop is if we cease testing and stop reporting. [That is a blatantly asinine, and ignorant remark. It’s like telling people if we stop testing for pregnancies, and counting births, the population will decline.]Keep in mind that hundreds of thousands have shown up to be tested, registered, left due to long waits, and still come up positive when they received their results.🤷🏼♀️[That remark suggests that tests are fabricated then falsified – that the results are fraudulent – and that a wholesale deceptive criminal enterprise exists throughout the entire testing chain, everywhere in all locations nationwide.]
This young girl in Bangladesh was infected with smallpox in 1973. Freedom from smallpox was declared in Bangladesh in December, 1977 when a WHO International Commission officially certified that smallpox had been eradicated from that country.
Is it a vaccine💉? It took 25 years for a chicken pox vaccine to be developed.[It seems as if the writer is beginning to understand the complexity and magnitude of the problem of vaccine development. The first varicella zoster vaccine was tested in Japan in 1974, and approved by the Japanese government in 1986 – a span of 12 years. The FDA approved a varicella vaccine in 1995, and in 1996 the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) voted to formally approve the vaccine for widespread use.] The smallpox inoculation was discovered in 1776 [Dr. Edward Jenner, MD, developed the first smallpox vaccine (using cowpox) in 1796.] and the last known natural case was in 1977.[SEE EXTENDED COMMENTS FOLLOWING THIS PARAGRAPH]We have a flu vaccine that is only 40 to 60% effective (that’s generous- the last two years it was more like 20-25%)[Influenza vaccines are developed in advance of the annual “flu season” using statistical inferences (prediction), and from 2004/2005 to 2018/2019 vaccine effectiveness (VE) estimates have ranged on average from 10% to 60%. For the 2018/2019 season, the overall VE rate was 29%.], less than half of the US population chooses to get one[The remark presumes that all people would get an influenza vaccine if they could – however, many cannot, typically either for reasons of lack of access, availability, or cost. In the Armed Services, vaccines are mandatory. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) analyzed data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) to estimate flu vaccination coverage for the U.S. population of adults aged ≥18 years during the 2017–18 flu season. Flu vaccination coverage among adults was 37.1%, a decrease of 6.2 percentage points from the previous flu season.], and roughly 20,000 Americans still die annually due to flu or flu complications.[From 2010/2011 through 2018/2019 influenza-related deaths have ranged from 12,000 to 61,000. The 2017/2018 year saw 61,000 influenza-related deaths, while the 2018/2019 year saw 34,157.] [EXTENDED COMMENTS: In late 1975, Rahima Banu, a three-year-old girl from Bangladesh, was the last person in the world to have naturally acquired variola major and the last person in Asia to have active smallpox. She was Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, August 23, 2020
Remember: It’ll “miraculously disappear” when the weather gets warmer, and “we totally have it under control.”
Of course, none of this is real.
It’s all just “fake news,” folks.
Nothing to see here.
Move along.
And what if, and when, it mutates?
When folks get COVID-19 -and- the seasonal influenza?
Because IT WILL HAPPEN.
There’s not just a HIGH likelihood that it will.
IT WILL HAPPEN.
Then what?
Remember ebola?
What if SARS-CoV, aka coronavirus or COVID-19, had been Ebola?
We and the world would’ve REALLY been fucked.
Given that the Current White House Occupant POS45 obliterated and practically eliminated the entire organizational infrastructure for biological terrorism and other biothreats to national security, it could happen.
It’s poised and ready to happen.
NOTE:
On July 20, 2017 Reuters reported that White House Homeland Security Adviser Thomas Bossert told the annual Aspen Security Forum that “We have not had as a country a comprehensive bio-defense strategy ever. It’s high time we had a bio-defense strategy,” and noted that retired Navy Rear Admiral Tim Ziemer was contributing to the development of the strategy as Senior Director for Global Health Security and Biothreats, National Security Council, and served in office April 2017 – May 8, 2018.
Tom Bossert, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism January 20, 2017 – April 10, 2018
Bossert noted that the Bush and Obama administrations took steps to address biological threats to National Security after Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, August 14, 2020
Apparently, it ~has~ come to this sorry state of affairs in our nation.
After Donald the Trump’s ravages, America will DEFINITELY need to be made great again.
Perhaps more than anything, this matter points to the need for the Federal government to step in and establish an across-the-board 50-state Uniform Voting Standard law so that there are NO inconsistencies whatsoever.
Presently, there are a plethora of voting laws nationwide, some even varying within the state, as evidenced by this sentence in the news item: “Ohio offers 28 days of early, in-person voting. Traditional, in-person voting also will be available on Election Day.”
“Early voting is one of two ways in which a registered voter of Tennessee may vote before the actual election day. The second way for a registered voter to vote early is called by-mail voting.
“The early voting period typically begins twenty (20) days before an election and ends five (5) days before an election. The exception is for the Presidential Preference Primary, when early voting ends seven (7) days before the election.”
Sentinelese tribesman shooting arrows at an Indian Coast Guard helicopter sent for a Health and Welfare check upon the remote, Stone Age islanders following the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.
Way out in the middle of the Indian Ocean’s Bay of Bengal on Sentinel Island, they are the world’s last known “uncontacted” people, meaning that no one other than them has ever known their language, they likely don’t know how to make fire, and are a hunter-gatherer type primitive people.
Reckon the coronavirus has wafted their way?
We’ll likely never know if they survive, or not, since we (civilization/humanity) don’t stop by for a visit and cup of tea every now and then – regular, or unplanned.
One of the last known official attempts at contact with them was via helicopter, when Indian government officials performed a type of “health and welfare safety check” following the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, and were fired upon by a tribesman using a bow and arrows.
After that, the last time anyone ever “checked upon” them was around November 2018, when the now-deceased self-styled missionary John Allen Chau violated Indian law by visiting the island, and later, was killed by them in his misguided evangelization efforts.
But what if somehow, they’re immune to COVID-19?
We’ll likely never know.
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia watching the military parade alongside aging veterans. Credit–Alexey Nikolsky/Sputnik, via Agence France-Presse; Aging veterans in their 80s and 90s joined Mr. Putin on the reviewing stand, nearly all of them without masks, to watch 14,000 troops march in tight formation to stirring martial music. Tanks, missiles and other military equipment then trundled through the square in front of the Kremlin, followed by a flyover by strategic bombers, fighter jets and helicopters.
Macho, Macho Man… I’ve got to be a macho man.
Like his Russian buddy Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump doesn’t wear any protective nose/mouth face mask/covering against the coronavirus. The man is tough – cheap steak tough. Like chickens, he eats rocks… to digest his food, since he has no stomach to speak of.
June 24th, Putin, along with many other elderly Russian veterans of WWII, participated in Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, August 11, 2020
He orders the Federal Reserve Chairman to buy stocks, bonds, and Exchange Traded Funds.
Yep… buying stocks and bonds will work just perfectly, because BUSINESS!
How much sense does that make, eh?
Buying stocks in companies that could go belly-up because NO ONE is BUYING their stuff is nonsensical – it’s a non-starter, a non sequitur.
Jerome Powell, Chair, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve speaks to guests during a conference at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, June 4, 2019.
Then who’s left holding the bag, eh?
You, me, and the taxpayers.
Instead, the Fed should just GIVE MONEY TO PEOPLE… who in turn will SPEND IT.
And THAT is what those firms need – paying customers.
Well, it was under her husband’s administration that private prisons popped up like mushrooms after a spring shower, which were then just as quickly populated with Blacks and Hispanics courtesy of his “Three Strikes” law – a law he championed which mandated a life sentence for anyone convicted of a violent crime after two prior convictions for any crime, including drug crimes – many of whom had been arrested on low-level, nonviolent drug charges – most typically as marijuana possession.
Mass incarceration was a Clinton concept.
He later admitted it was a bad idea and said, “I signed a bill that made the problem worse and I want to admit it.”
Because frankly, it’s practically too late for any of that.
That is to say, it’s too late for any effort to prevent the spread of COVID-19 by limiting travel, or immigration.
We’ve had our opportunity, and like many other opportunities, it was handed to us on a proverbial silver platter.
Now, we’ve the POTUS and his minions have squandered it.
Consider that as much as President Trump blows his own horn on the matter (as he does on almost everything, which according to him, he’s the best, the smartest, the greatest, the _insert_your_superlative_of_choice_here_ on anything and everything), claiming that his actions to limit its spread to the United States by limiting travelers from certain nations were effective, and helped prevent further spread of the infection, in light of what has happened in the days since as we all watched in horror at what unfolded.
They were not!
On January 22, while attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, POTUS was asked by CNBC Squawk Box host Joe Kernan if he was worried about a pandemic. Here’s the pertinent exchange.
JOE KERNEN: It was a couple of years ago. Before we get started– with- we’re going talk about the economy and a lot of other things–the CDC– has identified a case of coronavirus– in Washington state. The Wuhan strain of this. If you remember SARS, that affected GDP. Travel-related effects. Do you– have you been briefed by the CDC? And–
PRESIDENT TRUMP:I have, and–
JOE KERNEN: –are there worries about a pandemic at this point?
In a secret intelligence report prepared (yet denied) by the Army’s National Center for Medical Intelligence (NCMI) located on Fort Detrick, in Frederick, Maryland, which was based upon analysis of wire and computer intercepts, and satellite images, concerns that Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, July 28, 2020
“It is one thing to honor one’s Southern heritage; however, it is completely another issue to specifically commemorate the leader of an organization with an indisputable history of unconscionable actions and atrocities toward African-Americans.”
Alabama GOP Chair Terry Lathan (RIGHT, in red) with Donald Trump (LEFT)
Terry Lathan is correct – “it is completely another issue to specifically commemorate the leader of an organization with an indisputable history of unconscionable actions and atrocities toward African-Americans.”
But…
Can you smell the hypocrisy cooking?
By officially celebrating as holidays the birthdays of Confederate General Robert E. Lee, and President of the Confederacy Jefferson Davis, the State of Alabama “specifically commemorates the leader[s] of an organization with an indisputable history of unconscionable acts and atrocities toward African-Americans.”
That Madam Chairman Lathan specifically ignores the proverbial “elephant in the room” of racism, strains at the gnat of Will Dismukes, and swallows the camel of state-sponsored endorsement of the institution of slavery is the entire point. Will Dismukes is a gnat on the derriere of the ALGOP. Lathan is its mouthpiece.
Slavery, racism, and discrimination are Alabama’s heritage – a genuine homemade Southern mess. It’s tough to erase history, so they don’t even try. Instead, they embrace it as a lost sheep, welcoming it back into the Confederate fold.
Officially acknowledging Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis is the ULTIMATE act of hypocrisy, and the demonstration of Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, July 26, 2020
The removal of statuary commemorating or honoring men (typically) who were complicit in slavery has been a question in the public dialogue for many weeks and months.
Some ask, “What about George Washington and Thomas Jefferson?”
“What to do with all those statues?”
Both those men, notable for their role as founders of our nation, were slave owners.
The answer is a fairly easy one (or so I think), though it’s not one typically considered by the boogymen who raise the invented evil spectre of the so-called “cancel culture,” which is evidenced by their whipping up their non-thinking audience into a foaming-at-the-mouth froth.
A friend asked:
“Just that of something If the democrats want to get rid of all things slavery and racist, then should not the democrat party go away they start the KKK, Jim Crowe laws. What are your thoughts?” [sic]
Here’s my reply.
You raise an interesting question, one which exemplifies the complexity of the matter.
I think it’s important to reiterate that statuary of subjects about which public opinion has changed, and which has been, or considering being removed, should either be Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Saturday, July 25, 2020
Richmond Correctional Center, Alexandria, LA is owned by LaSalle Corrections, headquartered in Ruston, located directly SOUTH
Actions by employees of LaSalle Corrections – a Louisiana-headquartered private prison company with operations in Texas, Arizona, Georgia, New Mexico, and extensively in the Pelican State, which runs the Richwood Correctional Center (RCC) in Alexandria in the northern part of Louisiana – have spread COVID-19, and very likely other diseases to other individuals within the company, community, state, nationally, and internationally.
Located at 180 Pine Bayou Circle, Richwood, Louisiana 71202, (ICE facility website) RCC is a medium-security, 1129-bed capacity facility leased to the U.S Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The immigration detention center is also COVID-ravaged, and employees’ actions have likely created new diseases, and spread others – including Tuberculosis, and COVID-19 – because employees there regularly:
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Saturday, July 18, 2020
774.
Seven hundred seventy-four.
This illustration reveals ultrastructural morphology exhibited by the COVID-19 coronavirus. Note the spikes that adorn the outer surface of the virus, which impart the look of a corona surrounding the virion, when viewed electron microscopically. Image credit: CDC.
What’s that?
The number of people who have died per day since January 20, 2020 when COVID-19 was found inside the United States.
“The suit also alleges that after conversations broke down between the band — whose members are Hillary Scott, Charles Kelley and David Haywood — and the singer and their respective attorneys, White’s new counsel “delivered a draft settlement agreement that included an exorbitant monetary demand.” While the dollar figure is not mentioned in the suit, a statement concurrently issued by the band says the amount is $10 million.
““Today we are sad to share that our sincere hope to join together with Anita White in unity and common purpose has ended,” the group said in a statement. “She and her team have demanded a $10 million payment, so reluctantly we have come to the conclusion that we need to ask a court to affirm our right to continue to use the name Lady A, a trademark we have held for many years.””
The information for the story came from an Instagram post made by the trio which in part read:
“It was a stirring in our hearts and reflection on our own blindspots that led us to announce a few weeks ago that we were dropping the word ‘Antebellum’ from our name and moving forward using only the name so many of our fans already knew us by. When we learned that Ms. White had also been performing under the name Lady A, we had heartfelt discussions with her about how we can all come together and make something special and beautiful out of this moment. We never even entertained the idea that she shouldn’t also be able to use the name Lady A, and never will – today’s action doesn’t change that.
“Instead, we shared our stories, listened to each other, prayed and spent hours on the phone and text writing a song about this experience together. We felt we had been brought together for a reason and saw this as living out the calling that brought us to make this change in the first place. We’re disappointed that we won’t be able to work together with Anita for that greater purpose.
That kind of drivel – prosaic use of language such as “a stirring in our hearts,” and words such as “heartfelt,” phrases like “all come together and make something special and beautiful” – are purposely designed to pull at the emotional heartstrings of readers, and are nothing but a manipulative tool.
And for Southerners, at least – and Lady Antebellum is a musical ménage à trois of Three White Southerners – one must include religion, so it’s entirely apropos to let folks know that “we prayed.”
They just have the wrong god – mammon.
This entire ordeal stinks to high heaven of racism, and White Entitlement – it is the VERY embodiment, the quintessential substance of everything and every ideal that the Black Lives Matter movement stands for, and fights against – White Power.
It also shows Lady Antebellum’s utter lack of creativity.
A creative person could’ve announced a New Name Contest and given the three runners-up “consolation prizes” of $10,000 each, while the Grand Prize Winner – all which would be submitted and chosen by fans – a $100,000 cash prize.
But no… Lady Antebellum is not that creative.
The Three White Bitches would rather expend much more money to lawyer up and very publicly legally steal from a Black Woman.
There are a variety of names which they now ought to be called:
• Entitled White Thieves
• Three White Folks Stealing Names
• The Southern Bi-Sexual Ménage à Trois
• Three Musical Confederates
• Sorry… Not Sorry
• Three White Lives Matter More
• All White Meat: Two Men and a Woman
• We’re Richer Than You
or, the most apropos…
• Three Clueless White Southern Shitheads.
But if they really want to stay with the architectural theme, they could take:
• Ghost of Frank Lloyd Wright
• Greek Revival
• Dorian Columns
• Corinthian Scrolls
• Split-Level Singers
• Ranch-Style Songsters
• Idols of Excess
• Marble Columns
• Three Colonnades
• Spiral Staircase (that name has been used as “Spiral Starecase”)
• Cupola Singers
• Belvidere’s Belfry
Of course, another altogether unique option is:
The Band With A Racist Name
Joe Coscarelli of the New York Times wrote and confirmed the proceedings which the Nashville trio made “In the weeks that followed [the announcement made by Lady Antebellum to change their name], an apparent détente between the two parties, initially celebrated on social media by both sides, faltered when representatives for White “demanded a $10 million payment,” the band said in a statement on Wednesday. Now, the platinum-selling Nashville group has filed a lawsuit that seeks no monetary damages, but asks the court to affirm “a trademark we have held for many years.”
So apparently, the figure of $10 million came up in negotiations between Lady Antebellum and Lady A, which Lady A seemed to have proposed for use of the name “Lady A.”
The group apparently refused.
They’re only worth about $84 Million… and counting.
Ten million wouldn’t even begin to put a dent in their savings or checking accounts… or in the accounts of their corporations, or their accountants, or army of lawyers, or the numerous members of their extended entourages.
But seriously, the platinum-selling threesome has confessed being lackadaisical in their name choice, so this shenanigans is nothing but pure laziness on their part.
Statues, monuments, schools, buildings, parks, courthouse & government office grounds, counties/municipalities, roads, holidays, flags, scholarships, songs, and other things have all been named to dignify, commemorate, and honor traitorous loser Confederates.
It’s past time for the South – and the rest of the nation – to bury the myth of the Lost Cause once and for all.¹ ² ³ ⁴
In order to more fully understand the artwork, it must be placed in a proper context to be better interpreted. Further, it provides opportunity for preservation and care.
We see that in the many National Parks and on-site museums at Civil War battlefield sites. So placing such statuary in a museum, or other area -and- given a much more full explanation of the artist, the era, and the events commemorated, we can more fully understand the thing which is being interpreted. Andrew Jackson’s homeplace “The Hermitage” is such an example, and I have visited the site which is a park, museum, and interpretive center, along with other Civil War battlefield sites which also have museums and interpretive centers.
To simply place a thing in the public square with a plaque is a disservice to the art, and the artist, and to those who would interpret it – the viewers.
“Confederate markers do not provide a comprehensive look at the Civil War but rather focus narrowly on the Confederate war effort. In 2008, the Georgia Historical Society conducted a review of the more than 900 Civil War markers in the state. It found that “over 90 percent of the existing markers dealt strictly with military topics, leaving vast segments of the Civil War story untold — with almost no markers describing the war’s impact on civilians, politics, industry, the home front, African Americans, or women.””
Cold Harbor, Va. African Americans collecting bones of soldiers killed in the battle. Photographed by John Reekie, April 1865. Library of Congress. https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2018666599/ Title: [Cold Harbor, Va. African Americans collecting bones of soldiers killed in the battle] Creator(s): Reekie, John, photographer Date Created/Published: 1865 April. Medium: 1 negative : glass, wet collodion. Summary: Photograph from the main eastern theater of war, Grant’s Wilderness Campaign, May-June 1864. Reproduction Number: LC-DIG-cwpb-04324 (digital file from original neg.) LC-B8171-7926 (b&w film neg.) Rights Advisory: No known restrictions on publication. For information, see “Civil war photographs, 1861-1865,”(http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/res/120_cwar.html) Call Number: LC-B817- 7926 [P&P] LOT 4167-B (corresponding photographic print) Repository: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.print
The term Lost Cause first appeared in the title of an 1866 book by the historian Edward A. Pollard, The Lost Cause: A New Southern History of the War of the Confederates. However, it was the articles written for the Southern Historical Society by Lt. Gen. Jubal A. Early in the 1870s that established the Lost Cause as a long-lasting literary and cultural phenomenon.
Early’s original inspiration for his views may have come from General Robert E. Lee. In his farewell order to the Army of Northern Virginia, Lee spoke of the “overwhelming resources and numbers” that the Confederate army fought against.
The Lost Cause theme was taken up by memorial associations such as the United Confederate Veterans and the United Daughters of the Confederacy. The Lost Cause helped Southerners to cope with the social, political, and economic changes after the Civil War especially in the oppressive Reconstruction era.
Some of the main tenets of the Lost Cause movement were that:
Confederate generals such as Lee and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson represented the virtues of Southern nobility. This nobility was contrast most significantly in comparisons between U.S. Grant and Lee. The Northern generals, were characterized as men with low moral standards who engaged in vicious campaigns against Southern civilians such as Sherman’s March to the Sea and Philip Sheridan’s burning of the Shenandoah Valley in the Valley Campaigns of 1864.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, June 29, 2020
Donald Trump was never serious about becoming president, and campaigned exclusively as a lark, in order to better position himself in upcoming contract negotiations with NBC.
Thus said Howard Stern at least 3 years ago.
While it may have been a topic of some minor discussion earlier – and therefore not discussed much at all – Howard Stern, radio “shock jock” and self-described “King of All Media” – has been a long-time friend of the Current White House Occupant, the Liar in Chief himself, Donald J. “DJ” Trump.
As such, when Trump told Stern his plans, Stern said he advised Trump not to run, and later, again advised him to drop out of the running to become the Republican party’s nominee.
Trump has been a guest on Stern’s eponymous “The Howard Stern Show” many, many, many times. And socially, away from the microphone, Stern and Trump have enjoyed a long-running friendly relationship. Suffice it to say, Trump and Stern are intertwined – not quite inexplicably, or even inexorably, but definitely inescapably.
With over 24 appearances over 20 years, it would be reasonable to say that Trump has some level of relationship with Stern.
I’ve not yet seen any images – still, or video – of Black folks out protesting that their (or any) barbershops oughta’ be forced to reopen, that their (or any) restaurants oughta’ be forced to reopen, that their (or any) favorite (_fill_in_the_blank_) ought to be forced to reopen, etc.
But I’ve sure seen a whole lotta’ images of White folks doing stupid stuff like that… and very publicly making general asses of themselves in the process – including openly brandishing loaded assault rifles and other dangerous weapons in state’s capitols and in other headquarters of civil governance.
I mean, there SERIOUSLY doesn’t seem to be any Democrats, or Independent voters doing stuff like that.
When Will Hillary Go Away?
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, August 9, 2020
Hillary Clinton continues to show her ass, and her most recent inane comment via Twitter (“Either Tim Kaine and I had a very vivid shared hallucination four years ago or Maureen had too much pot brownie before writing her column again.“) about Maureen Dowd’s column just proves how classless that conniving, subterranean racist, political wanna-be is. She might as well have called her a “racially disparaging term beginning with the letter ’N’ and ending with the letter ‘R’.”
Why?
Well, it was under her husband’s administration that private prisons popped up like mushrooms after a spring shower, which were then just as quickly populated with Blacks and Hispanics courtesy of his “Three Strikes” law – a law he championed which mandated a life sentence for anyone convicted of a violent crime after two prior convictions for any crime, including drug crimes – many of whom had been arrested on low-level, nonviolent drug charges – most typically as marijuana possession.
Mass incarceration was a Clinton concept.
He later admitted it was a bad idea and said, “I signed a bill that made the problem worse and I want to admit it.”
Brother Bill also was the architect behind the idea to “end welfare as we have come to know it,” which was formerly a robust social safety net.
So yeah… my opinion of them both is lower’n a snake’s belly.
Of course, there’s been “bad blood” between Dowd and Hillary for quite some time.
The Daily Mail wrote that “In 2014 Dowd wrote a series of articles about Read the rest of this entry »
Rate this:
I Gotta' Share This!
Like this:
Posted in - Did they REALLY say that?, - Lost In Space: TOTALLY Discombobulated, - Read 'em and weep: The Daily News | Tagged: cannabis, Clinton, commentary, Hillary Clinton, HRC, marijuana, Maueen Dowd, Monica Lewinsky, news, NYT, OpEd, politics, racism, scandal, Tweet, weed, Willie Nelson | Leave a Comment »