“Paid for by Donald J. Trump for President, Inc.”

Self dealing.

You’d think it was a crime, eh?

But, did you know that it is NOT illegal to shift campaign money into your private account?

Actually, directly, it is.

On their website, the Federal Election Commission states in part that, “Using campaign funds for personal use is prohibited.” (https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/making-disbursements/personal-use/)

They state further that, “Commission regulations provide a test, called the “irrespective test,” to differentiate legitimate campaign and officeholder expenses from personal expenses. Under the “irrespective test,” personal use is any use of funds in a campaign account of a candidate (or former candidate) to fulfill a commitment, obligation or expense of any person that would exist irrespective of the candidate’s campaign or responsibilities as a federal officeholder.”

But indirectly?

That’s a horse of an entirely different color.

In the white-collar criminal underground, that’s called “money laundering,” which is the practice of shifting money through legitimate business enterprises in order to make it appear as if the money was obtained legitimately.

And that is but one reason why the FBI encourages accounting majors in university to consider joining their service – because scouring the financial books of businesses and other entities takes a well-trained eye to discern criminal wrong-doing.

On June 16, 2015, Donald Trump stood in Trump Tower, New York City, and said, “I’m using my own money. I’m not using the lobbyists. I’m not using donors. I don’t care. I’m really rich.” (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/transcript-donald-trump-announces-his-presidential-candidacy/)

With that remark in part, he announced his candidacy to be the GOP’s nominee for President.

Of note, that was also when he’d made his now-infamous remark that, “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people. But I speak to border guards and they tell us what we’re getting. And it only makes common sense. It only makes common sense. They’re sending us not the right people. It’s coming from more than Mexico. It’s coming from all over South and Latin America, and it’s coming probably — probably — from the Middle East. But we don’t know. Because we have no protection and we have no competence, we don’t know what’s happening. And it’s got to stop and it’s got to stop fast.”

But earlier – 5 years earlier, in fact – he’d said to Fortune magazine in April 3, 2000, that, “It’s very possible that I could be the first presidential candidate to run and make money on it.” (https://fortune.com/2000/04/03/what-does-donald-trump-really-want/)

In December 2018, Forbes magazine reported that

Democratic Tea Leaves II

In a recent entry dated August 8, 2019, entitled Reading Democratic Tea Leaves I noted one, or two very fine, somewhat minor points overlooked by most pundits.

One, that like most other Democratic nominee candidates, former Vice President Joe Biden’s support has largely stagnated – even though it has been higher than most other candidates.

Vice President Joe Biden, Official Portrait 2013

And second, only two other candidates have had any SIGNIFICANT INCREASE in their level of support (as defined by polling) since the inception of their candidacy: South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren.

Since the announcement of his candidacy as the Democratic nominee for President, former Vice President Joe Biden’s support has gone from 29.0% to 30.8%. That’s an increase of only 6.21%.

October 26, 2016; South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg

In sharp contrast, “Mayor Pete” has gone from 1.0% and is now (August 10) at 6.5%, and has polled as high as 8.4% from April 20 through May 2. That’s an increase of 550% to date. If fluctuations are considered (low to high), that’s 740%.

Senator Warren, however, has gone from 5.3% and is now at 18.3% – her highest ever polling. That’s an increase, and fluctuation of 245.28%.

Senator Sanders started at

Reading Democratic Tea Leaves

The Democratic candidates’ field is as great for the upcoming 2020 General Election as the Republicans’ 2016 was – and, that may, or may not be a good sign.

The 2016 GOP clown car was populated by, among others, Donald Trump, Texas Senator Ted Cruz, Ohio Governor John Kasich, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, retired pediatric neurosurgeon Ben Carson, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, former Virginia Governor Jim Gilmore, former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, and former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee.

Aside from them, there were 10 others who withdrew before the primaries, so say it was a crowded field, was a gross understatement.

Now, it’s the Democrats’ turn.

The 20-candidate field has not yet been winnowed, per se – at least not by prospective primary voters.

Among them, is one of the last candidates to join that field was former Vice President Joe Biden, who had the advantage of name recognition among all voters, and potential voters.

Because of his name recognition advantage, Biden’s “popularity” within the massive field has led the next closest competitors – which are Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren – sometimes by double digits.

A notable game-changing exception was made following the first Democratic debate at The Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami, Florida, with NBC Moderators Savannah Guthrie, Lester Holt, Chuck Todd, Rachel Maddow and José Diaz-Balart on Night 2 (June 27) when California Senator Kamala Harris took former Vice President Joe Biden to task for his opposition as then-Senator from Delaware to busing to remedy and resolve the problem of segregation in California pubic schools.

Up until that time, Harris was polling 7.0%, while Biden was at 32.0%. After that night, support for Harris doubled to 15.2%, while Biden experienced a corresponding 6-point drop to 26.0%.

Since that high, Harris has continued to fall, and as of August 7 was polling at 8.3%.

Up until then, Sanders, the next-closest competitor, had fluctuated from 16.5% to 24.0% (his highest), to 14.0% (his lowest), and as of August 7, was polling at 15.8%.

Biden’s polling has been as high as

Second Democratic Debate, Night 2 Analysis

2nd Democratic Debate, Night 2 – Detroit, MI

Analysis

As was earlier mentioned on The Week website, CNN wasted viewers’ time by taking very nearly 30 minutes before the first question was asked, which was in stark contrast to NBC News’ first question within 60 seconds. And then, after an elaborate opening, they went directly to a commercial break, which was followed by candidates’ opening remarks.

CNN pitted the candidates against each other by baiting. The lead question was directed at Senator Harris which attacked Biden and her M4A (Medicare for All) plan.

The candidates’ positions, for the greatest part, were quite similar, and CNN’s efforts were to attack the presumptive leader, which in that night was Biden.

There were 117 so-called “questions” (opportunities for verbal exchange) lobbed by CNN at the 10 candidates, the first 10 of those 117 are:

1.) Senator Harris, this week you released a new health care plan which would preserve private insurance and take 10 years to phase in. Vice President Biden’s campaign calls your plan, quote, “a have-it-every-which-way approach” and says it’s just part of a confusing pattern of equivocating about your health care stance. What do you say to that?

2.) Thank you, Senator. Thank you, Senator Harris. Vice President Biden, your response.

3.) Your response, Senator Harris?

4.) Senator Harris, thank you. Vice President Biden, your response?

5.) Thank you, Senator Harris. Mayor de Blasio, let’s bring you in here. What’s your response?

6.) Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Vice President Biden, you just heard Mayor de Blasio. He said in the past that Democrats who wanted to keep the private insurance industry are defending a health care system that is not working. What’s your response?

7.) Thank you, Mr. Vice President. Senator Gillibrand, you support Medicare for All. How do you feel about Senator Harris continuing to call her health proposal Medicare for All, when it includes a far more significant role for private insurance than the bill you co-sponsored?

8.) Thank you, Senator Gillibrand. Senator Harris, your response?

9.) Thank you, Senator Harris. Vice President Biden, your response?

10.) Thank you, Mr. Vice President. Thank you. Senator Booker, let me bring you in here. You say you support Medicare for All. You also say you are not going to pull private health insurance from more than 150 million Americans in exchange for a government plan, but that’s what Medicare for All would do. How do you square that?

Within those opening questions/exchanges, former Vice President Biden was mentioned by CNN 12 times, either by surname, by title, or combination of the two. The runner-up was

The GOP Hopes That You Keep Sleeping

America has become like the proverbial frog in a pot of water, which has slowly, but steadily, increased in temperature to the point that it is boiled alive without realizing it.

As the story goes, if the frog were dumped into boiling water, it would immediately jump out.

But, since the water’s temperature was initially comfortable, even pleasant, and only slowly increased, the frog gradually became acclimated to it, and therefore was, in effect, desensitized to the inevitable, impending danger, and died slowly.

For the past nearly 50 years or so, and more specifically, within the last 38, America has swooned under the siren song led by the GOP, which in part started off with the not-so-oblique condemnation that, “In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.” (As Brian Gurney, a private citizen from California, noted: “You can’t govern if you don’t believe in government.” But set up a straw man, and beat it to a pulp – demonize the Constitutional effigy.) And to sweeten the deal, and help matters along, a little bit of “They’re individuals and families whose taxes support the government and whose voluntary gifts support church, charity, culture, art, and education. Their patriotism is quiet, but deep. Their values sustain our national life,” was thrown in for good measure (“a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down,” you know).

In order to facilitate that destruction, first was an appetizer of dessert – across-the-board personal income tax rates were cut 23%, which made the majority of working-class Americans and families very happy.

But then, calling them “job creators,” (veritable sacred cows which should be left alone to wander about in traffic and poop anywhere they desire) another round of personal income tax cuts came around, this time for the elites, and personal income tax rates upon the very wealthiest Americans was dramatically slashed to less than half the former rate – from 70% to 28%.

And then, there came cries and demands for liberty, and freedom from the tyranny of genuine governmental slavery in the form of, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” And truly, who could disagree? But that was quickly transformed into efforts to squelch personal liberty as healthcare decision-making in the most intimate of, and deeply personal matters involving reproduction, by providing opportunity for nosy neighbors (government) to tell others how they ought to run their lives according to the dictates of others’ religious convictions, all under the auspices of government.

Dissatisfied with that aspect of control, they sought to again meddle into the private lives of others – despite the fact that their private liberties were not encroached upon – and the sanction of committed legal relationships in the civil sector were forbidden to select individuals… just like it once was with ethnic minorities. And when in indignation they invited the SCOTUS to step in and rule (hopefully to their advantage, though contrary to their own religious writings), which ruled against their religiously-motivated (no religious test), publicly-sanctioned governmental discrimination (equal protection under law), they loudly cried ‘FOUL!’

And then, when more of their hand-picked, fair-haired children ruled against them, that rights were not absolute (D.C. v Heller), that not just anyone had a right to own, possess, or brandish any firearm, anywhere, at any time, they couldn’t stand it any more, and falsely accused the SCOTUS of partiality and of siding with their opponents whom they continuously maligned, despite the fact that they were ruled against by one of their own most staunch hard-liners.

Feeling emboldened, their most powerful, yet little-known instigator went public and said in part that,

Watch Democrats Debate in Detroit

Tonight – Tuesday, 29 July – at the Fox Theater in Detroit, MI, the first night of the second round of debates among the Democratic presidential primary candidates will start at 7PM Central Standard Time, and conclude around 9:30PM CST. The debates will be held two days, 29 and 30 July, beginning the same time both nights.

The debates will air live on CNN, CNN International, and CNN en Español at 8 p.m. Eastern each night.

They’ll also stream live, without requiring log-in to a cable provider, on CNN.com, CNN’s apps for iOS and Android, and via CNNgo apps for Apple TV, Roku, Amazon Fire, Chromecast, and Android TV.

The moderators for the CNN debates will be

Democrats Detroit Debate, Night 1

UPDATE: Today, around 10AM CST, a fatal shooting occurred at a Wal-Mart store in Southaven,MS – the 3rd largest city in the state, population 49,000, and a rural suburb of Memphis – in which two people died, and one law enforcement officer was wounded.
–//–
Tonight, Tuesday, July 20, 2019, will be the first night of the 2nd Democratic Debate, which will be held in Detroit, MI.

Political Prediction: Joe Biden will go down in flames.

Then-Vice President Joe Biden cops a feel of then-Democratic Presidential nominee, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on the Scranton, PA airport tarmac on her campaign trail in August 2016.

Why?

Despite the fact of his 10-15 point lead in polls over his next closest competitors, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, former Vice President creepy “Uncle Joe” Biden remains vulnerable on many political fronts. In his 36-year Senate history, he has voted on thousands of bills, some of which have been very costly to Americans, fiscally, and sociologically.

One such bill was first mentioned by California Senator Kamala Harris, which was Biden’s early opposition to busing as a tool to integrate and desegregate schools. After her announcement of that almost-forgotten historical item at the first Democratic candidates debate in Miami, Biden’s support – as polled – fell at least 15 points.

Senator Joe Biden as Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee when he helped write the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act, which created the “Gun Show Loophole.”

Recently, New Jersey Senator Cory Booker has criticized Biden somewhat obliquely (though not by name) when he Tweeted

Joe’s Gotta’ Go… Home – to Bake Cookies in Scranton

Bye bye, Biden!

Former Vice President Joe Biden, a 36-year career politician as United States Senator from Delaware, has historically been instrumental in establishing many laws which now trouble our nation, which have also proven costly economically, injudicious, racially divisive, and degrading to the moral social fabric of our nation – the family.

Senator Joe Biden (DE) as Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee when he helped write the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act, which created the “Gun Show Loophole.”

Unbeknown (or, more accurately, forgotten) to many, he also helped create the so-called “Gun Show Loophole” – a specially-carved-out niche in Federal firearms legislation (the Firearm Owners’ Protection Act, FOPA) that allowed firearm and ammunition sales via the Internet, and forbade background investigations for firearm purchases at gun shows, which in turn not only popularized the modern gun show, but significantly contributed to mass shootings.

Perhaps he should be called “Gun Show Joe.”

–//–

Cory Booker, United States Senator from New Jersey

Senators Kamala Harris (CA) and Cory Booker (NJ) have signaled the beginning of the end for the Biden campaign by first acknowledging Biden’s historical opposition to busing, and now with Booker’s July 23rd Tweet acknowledging Biden’s support for mass incarceration, which has disproportionately harmed Blacks and Hispanics, both racial/ethnic minority communities, and exacted enormous taxpayer borne tolls – “It’s not enough to tell us what you’re going to do for our communities, show us what you’ve done for the last 40 years. You created this system. We’ll dismantle it.”

Senator Kamala Harris fired the first proverbial shot across the bow of the SS Biden by mentioning that Biden, as Senator from Delaware, opposed school integration by busing.

Now, Senator Booker has proverbially lobbed a grenade – if not fired a mortar round – into the Biden camp.

Biden’s aspirations will be proverbially shot down in this Tuesday and Wednesday night’s debate, July 30, and 31 in Detroit, and the aircraft of his once-flying-high candidacy to be the Democratic party’s 2020 Presidential nominee – and by extension, as President – will go down in flames. One only wonders at what point he’ll parachute from the burning craft, in order to save his own life – which in allegorical and metaphorical context, is his reputation.

Kamala Harris, United States Senator from California

Simply put, Joe’s gotta’ go.

Go home to bake cookies in Scranton, where he belongs — NOT in the White House.

His very own track record will be his political demise.

—//—

https://www.npr.org/2019/07/29/745715773/biden-promises-no-more-mr-nice-guy-in-second-democratic-debate

Joe Biden, Cory Booker, Kamala Harris Ready For Showdown On Race In Debate

“He described Biden as an “architect of mass incarceration,” when speaking with reporters last week at the annual NAACP convention in Detroit.

“Booker was referring to Biden’s role as a champion of the controversial 1994 crime bill, which critics and some experts say led to a disproportionate number of African American men being imprisoned.

“”I’m disappointed that it’s taken Joe Biden years until he was actually running for president to actually say that he made a mistake, that there were things in that bill that were extraordinarily bad. For him not to have a more comprehensive, bold plan to deal with this is unacceptable to me, especially because he is partially responsible for the crisis that we have now.“”

Try and stop the rain? How about building infrastructure, instead?

Extensive flooding in Muscle Shoals, AL in the NW corner of the state, in the spring of 2019

The news article which flows from the NASA story (I know… bad pun) appears below.

But either way, as usual, I’m eager to know your thoughts.

https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/145101/record-setting-precipitation-leaves-us-soils-soggy/

Small Towns Fear They Are Unprepared For Future Climate-Driven Flooding

–

https://www.npr.org/744203716

—//—

Tennessee River flooding (bottom) contrasted with normal conditions (top) under O’Neal Bridge which joins Colbert (in the south) and Lauderdale (to the north) counties in the Shoals area of NW AL

Some folks talk about a “Green New Deal” as a prospective course of action to remedy (ameliorate) the effects of Climate Change, and to provide economic impetus.

While there may be some merit to some aspects of that now-nebulous idea, there is a much more immediate and concrete need we have in response to Climate Change.

And that is, to build, expand, and repair our Economic Infrastructure in order to reduce – as much as humanly possible – the costly continual damages that are now occurring, and which will continue to occur, because of Climate Change.

When faced with flooding, a proper response is not to try and stop the rain;

it is to build levees, dams, waterways, sluices, ponds, and other hydrological management resources – including pipelines, and other such mechanisms – to prevent the damage that would otherwise occur without implementation of such measures.

Here’s a very real case in point to illustrate that very matter – the North Sea Flood of 1953.

Buid Zeeland, Netherlands 1953 North Sea Flood
Image made by U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) from a U.S. Army helicopter of the 1953 North Sea Flood in the Netherlands.

Described as the worst natural disaster in Europe in modern times, the flooding occurred over a two-day period January 31 – February 1, and affected Netherlands, Belgium, England and Scotland, with a total of 2551 lives lost, and 1836 in the Netherlands alone.

Dutch losses were particularly enormous, principally because

A Rose By Any Other Name

Read this and tell me what you think.

—//—

Oversight of the Report on the Investigation into County Interference in the 1996 Mayoral Election: Former Dedicated Prosecutor Richard S. Mabry, Jr.

Councilman Tommy Lawry (Westside):
Thank you Superintendent Mabry for your long history of service to our country, including your service as a Marine, where you earned the Bronze Star with a ‘V’ device. I’d like to now turn to the elements of Obstruction of Justice as applied to the mayor’s attempts to curtail your investigation. The first element of Obstruction of Justice requires and obstructive act. Correct?

Mr. Mabry: Correct.

Lawry: I’d like to direct you to page 97 of Volume 2 of your report, and you wrote there on page 97, quote “Sitter was being instructed to tell the Dedicated Prosecutor to end the existing investigation into the mayor and his campaign,” unquote. That’s in the report – correct?

Mabry: Correct

Lawry: That would be evidence of an obstructive act because it would naturally obstruct an investigation. Correct?

Mabry: Ah… correct.

Lawry: Let’s now turn to the second element of the crime of Obstruction of Justice which requires a nexus to the official proceeding. Again, I’m going to direct you to page 97 – the same page in Volume 2 – and you wrote, quote, “by the time the mayor’s initial one-on-one meeting with LaChance on June 19, 1987, the existence of a grand jury investigation by the Dedicated Prosecutor was public knowledge.” That’s in the report – correct?

Mabry: Correct.

Lawry: That would constitute evidence of a nexus to an official proceeding, because the grand jury investigation is an official proceeding… correct?

Mabry: Yes.

Lawry: I can now turn to the final element of the crime of obstruction of justice. On that same page – page 97 – do you see where there’s an intent section on that page? (unintelligible)

Mabry: Correct.

Lawry: Would you be willing to

Republicans’ Wet Dream

Abolish all “social safety net” programs along with all Progressive, New Deal, and Great Society eras’ legislation, agencies, and bureaus, including the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the Clean Air Act of 1970, Clean Water Act of 1972, including reversing Roe v Wade, and repealing the 17th Amendment.

Return America to the “good ol’ days” of a dog-eat-dog, wild-wild-West, unmitigated, unregulated free-for-all.

Face it, many – if not most – GOPers think FDR a pariah, a veritable scion of the dread “socialism,” and LBJ as traitor to the “Lost Cause.”

The GOP is winning – hands down – the rhetoric game. And they’ve allowed it to be ratcheted up to 11 with the 45th president. And if things continue as they have been, he’ll cruise to re-election just as handily as he did before.

Most everyone in the world who has been paying even the least bit of attention, knows full well what he’s capable of saying… er, scratch that. He’s a loose cannon, and as unpredictable as a bull in a china shop, who’ll literally say anything, for any reason, at any time. Just be assured it’ll be an utter wreck by the time he leaves. And he’ll deny he ever did anything.

And the people are completely stupefied and stymied – frozen, like deer in the headlights – by the proliferation of it all. The multiplication of mass media, their advertising-funded talking heads – network, or not – are concerned exclusively with eyes on the set, and website click-bait revenue, and nothing more. It drives ratings, and increases the price they can ask for advertising.

For them, it’s all about the green.

Money.

And that’s the game the GOP plays… in part.

Fear is the other.

Simply let some GOP sycophant say something like “those illegal-alien loving, socialist Democrats are gonna’ take away your jujubees, make harvesting honeycomb illegal -and- raise your taxes!,” and POOF! Just like that, the lemmings are running off… to the voting booth, with a voter guide published by some coalition of religious fanatics who have jumped on the exploitation of victimization bandwagon and falsely claim that the “Big Bad Wolf” of Washington is going to take away their religious freedom, and force their children to be sacrificed to Molech.

But instead, they’ve only laid out their genuine imitation faux sheepskins to be fleeced by the wrong god – the one whose hair they comb every morning. Their shepherds are simply wolves in sheep’s clothing, living in multi-million dollar mansions, flying in their privately owned jets, and living the high life, all financed by the impoverished, and laid upon the broken backs of those whom they claim to heal – all while paying no taxes.

If the Democrats would simply STOP responding to every vacuous, puerile comment made by the pablum-puking infantile Idiot in Chief, and were to take command of any debate on matters of public policy, and explain to the people how they will either be harmed, or positively helped in very concrete ways, they would quickly gain the confidence of many disaffected registered voters who now sit on the sidelines stewing in silent disenfranchisement.

But the sway of stupidity, and the siren song of public opinion, drives the ever-shifting winds of change. And the sands of time fall through the hourglass just as timelessly as it has marched on for the last 50 years and more.

I can understand the immense sense of frustration which was the motivating animus that propelled Trump into the Oval office.

However, I cannot understand how so many completely

In Praise of Regulation

It’s said that “power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

Though Lord Acton (John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton (1834–1902), the first Baron Acton) is often attributed with originating that phrase in an 1887 letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton, the idea itself was not new to him, and was known to have been expressed in 1770 by in a speech to the UK House of Lords by William Pitt the Elder, Earl of Chatham, who was British Prime Minister 1766–1778.

Our nation’s Founders understood that principle quite well, as evidenced by the systems of oversight, and the establishment of three separate, co-equal branches of government which they established via the Constitution – which was ratified June 21, 1788.

Absolute power, in a market sense, is about money and corrupting influence that almost always accompanies unchecked concentrated power. In this era, we see it commonly as a desire to abolish rules, regulations, and laws designed to protect the people.

That’s but one underlying reason why the GOP wants to abolish “ObamaCare” – so that power (and money) may be concentrated in the hands of the already-powerful.

We the people have the final say-so, because

Br’er Trump & Br’er Biden

If you’ve ever heard of the Uncle Remus story of B’rer Rabbit, popularized by Walt Disney’s movie Song of the South, you’ll recognize the line he utters to Br’er Fox saying, “Please Br’er Fox don’t throw me in the briar patch!”

And then, Br’er Fox, thinking he’d do significant harm to him, and even kill him, threw Br’er Rabbit in the briar patch. But Br’er Rabbit pops up unscathed and laughingly mocks Br’er Fox as he exclaims, “I’se born and bred in the briar patch!”

The current White House occupant has said “I’d rather run against, I think, Biden than anybody.”

Of course POS45 wants to campaign against “Sleepy Uncle Joe” Biden!

Why?

Just like the trickster character Br’er Rabbit, he was

Joe Biden: “My time’s up.”

“My time’s up. I’m sorry.“

– former VP Joe Biden, in his first primary “debate” appearance among the 20+ Democratic nominee wanna’ be’s, on the second night of the two-night event in Miami, FL, Thursday, 27 June 2019

Truer words were ne’er spoken.
He’s right.
Your time is up, Joe.
Gotta’ move on.

Joe Biden is a dinosaur, a relic from a different age, but it has nothing to do with his age.

He claims to be a Democrat, but his track record speaks for itself.

When then-Vice President Biden made a ceremonial appearance on the Senate floor Monday, December 5, 2016, in response to the 21st Century Cures Act, which had a major portion of the law renamed after his late son Beau, who earlier died from brain cancer – The Beau Biden Memorial Moonshot – which allocated $1.8 Billion for cancer research, he was asked by a reporter what his plans were after leaving office, and if he had other political ambitions, Mr. Biden flippantly dead-panned saying, “Yeah, I am. I’m going to run in 2020.”

The reporter responded asking, “For what?”

Mr. Biden replied, “For president. What the hell, man! Anyway…”

When he was later asked to clarify his remark, Vice President Biden attempted to retract his remark by saying “I’m not committing not to run. I’m not committing to anything. I learned a long time ago fate has a strange way of intervening.”

The next day later, in an appearance Tuesday, December 6, 2016, on “The Late Show” with host Stephen Colbert, Mr. Biden said in part, that “I’m a great respecter of fate. I don’t plan on running again. But to say you know what’s going to happen in four years, I just think is

2019 Democratic Debate: Night 1

The clear leaders for the first night were Massachusetts United States Senator Elizabeth Warren, and New Jersey United States Senator Cory Booker.

Here’s some analysis.

Historically, Senators have been better poised to win the White House than Representatives, with 16 having become POTUS, while 18 Governors have become POTUS.

The United States Senate website writes this about Senators:
“To date, 16 senators have also served as president of the United States. Three Senators, Warren G. Harding, John F. Kennedy, and Barack Obama moved directly from the U.S. Senate to the White House.”

That’s 16/45, or 35.5%, of all POTUSes who were ever a Senator. And 3/16, or 18.75%, were elected as POTUS directly from the Senate.

The House of Representatives website states this about Representatives who later became POTUS:
“Since 1789, 19 Members of the House have served as President of the United States. Four Members — John Tyler, Millard Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, and Gerald Ford — were never elected to the Presidency, having succeeded a President who died or resigned. Only Gerald Ford was never successfully elected as either President or Vice President, though he served in both positions.”

For the House, that’s 19/45, or 42.2% who later became POTUS. However, only 1 – James Garfield – ever went directly from the House to the White House, and that’s 1/45, or 2.2%.

Since 1901, the

Biden: When I started in the Senate, I got along with racist White Supremacists.

Vice President Joe Biden, Official Portrait 2013

Former Vice President Joe Biden, a Democratic candidate – among the 20-plus wanna’ be’s – campaigning to be the party’s 2020 Presidential nominee, has recently taken flack for his waffling, wavering, moving-target positions on women, abortion, and civil rights.

Once, he supported the Hyde Amendment.

Now, he opposes it.

Once, he got along with racist bigots.

Now… he apparently still does.

Biden’s wishy-washy, ever-changing positions are nothing new.

In an appearance Tuesday, December 6, 2016, on “The Late Show” with host Stephen Colbert, Mr. Biden said in part, that “I’m a great respecter of fate. I don’t plan on running again. But to say you know what’s going to happen in four years, I just think is – is not rational. I can’t see the circumstance in which I’d run, but what I’ve learned a long, long, long time ago, Stephen, is to never say never. You don’t know what’s going to happen. Hell, Donald Trump is going to be 74. I’ll be 77 and in better shape. Who knows?”

Now, he’s announced his candidacy to be the Democratic Party’s nominee for President.

And in 1968, then a newly-minted lawyer, having earned the Juris Doctorate from Syracuse University College of Law, for six months, Mr. Biden clerked for a Wilmington, Delaware law firm led by William Pickett, who was a prominent local Republican, and said that he “thought of myself as a Republican.”

That same year, Mr. Biden also staunchly opposed forced school busing to combat segregation, and called it “a phony issue which allows the White liberals to sit in suburbia, confident that they are not going to have to live next to Blacks.”

Most recently, Mr. Biden has come under fire for his remarks made at

2020 Democratic Crystal Ball

Biden, Bernie, Warren, Buttegieg, Harris…

Let the winnowing begin!

Much is being made about former Vice President Joe Biden’s candidacy to be the Democratic nominee for President. Pundits point to polling showing him with narrowing leads over Senators Bernie Sanders (VT-I), and Elizabeth Warren (MA), respectively, all whom have double digit support, while South Bend, IN Mayor Pete Buttigieg, and California Senator Kamala Harris are contending runners-up, in that order, with single-digit support among those polled.

However, since Biden announced his candidacy – he was the last Democratic candidate to announce, and did so on April 25, 2019 – detractors within and without the party have noted several weaknesses of his, including his historic ham-handed touchy-feely behavior with women, his shifting position on abortion vis-à-vis the Hyde Amendment – which forbids the use of Federal funds to pay for abortion, except in cases to save the life of the woman, or in pregnancy arising from rape, and/or incest – and perhaps most ignobly, his handling as Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee in the matter concerning Anita Hill, who testified under oath that Clarence Thomas, then a nominee for Supreme Court Justice to replace the seat being vacated by the impending retirement of Thurgood Marshall, had sexually harassed her while her supervisor as Assistant Secretary of Education in the Office for Civil Rights at the Department of Education, and then again as the Reagan-appointed Chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, where he later fired her.

Critics have noted that other female witnesses, all interviewed by the FBI, were prepared to substantiate Hill’s testimony, but were not called because of a private compromise between Biden, as the Committee Chair, and Republicans, who feared their corroborating testimony would sink the 1991 George H.W. Bush nominee.

Additional criticism of Biden’s candidacy revolves around his ethnicity, and the increasing concerns that Anglo candidates – even in the Democratic party – historically have not had the best interests of racial/ethnic minority communities at heart.

Then, there’s the matter of his age – now 77 – which, if elected, would make him even older than the current White House occupant, who was aged 70 when elected. But, consider also that Bernie Sanders is one year older than Biden, and that the majority of POTUSes – 39 (86.66%) – have been aged 45 to 64, while 25 (55.55%) were aged 50 to 59.

Essentially, Biden, perhaps more so than any other Democratic candidate, represents

Fetal Heartbeat Bills, Citizenship, and Taxes

Here are a few thoughts and three points about so-called “fetal heartbeat” bills enacted by AL & a handful of other states:

1.) Our U.S. Constitution does NOT support the notion that a fetus is a person because – and as the Catholic Church has long taught – life begins at birth, NOT conception. AND, the Scripture clearly states that the Almighty breathed the “breath of life” at which point “the man became a living being” into Adam. So we see clearly from that religious text in Judaic scripture (the Genesis account) that breathing is equated with life, not conception.

For if life began at conception, then “personhood” and citizenship is imbued at that moment (of conception).

An example of the current (2000’s) CRBA (Consular Report of Birth Abroad).

What that effectively means, is that a fetus conceived overseas (to an immigrant couple, for example, who later became naturalized American citizens before giving birth), the conceived fetus would be a citizen of wherever it was conceived… EVEN IF the child was delivered/born in the U.S.A. Clearly, that is contrary to

Could “Uncle Joe” Biden become POTUS?

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders (I) official portrait

Joe Biden (D), official VP portrait

Much is being made about the impending Sanders v Biden match-up in the Democratic party for the 2020 General Election.

Detractors of the Democratic party say that Biden has a better possibility of being the party’s nominee because – as one Republican pundit wrote – “Biden, and others running for the Oval Office, are terrified that Hispanics and blacks – who reliably vote Democratic – might be swayed by rising wages or better job prospects, to vote for Trump.”

News writers, who are supposed to have (one hopes) some degree of objectivity, seem to have also fallen prey to the Biden 2020 siren song, and have written remarks like “Mr. Biden’s advantage with black voters not only helps him amass delegates ahead of the Democratic convention, but helps counter the widespread perception that he is a candidate running on a bygone appeal to the white working class.”

Recently, a Quinnipiac University Poll published May 15, 2019 found that in Pennsylvania, “former Vice President Joseph Biden is over the 50 percent mark in a matchup with President Donald Trump, leading 53 – 42 percent.” Quinnipiac University is “a private, coeducational university in Southern New England” with campuses “in Hamden and North Haven, Connecticut.”

Overall, the poll found that “Trump leads 90 – 7 percent among Pennsylvania Republicans. Biden leads 93 – 6 percent among Democrats and 51 – 37 percent among independent voters.”

Other top Democratic contenders matched up against Trump as follows:
• Senator Bernie Sanders (I) VT 50% – 43% Trump
• Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren 47 % – 44% Trump
• California Senator Kamala Harris 45% – 45% Trump
• South Bend, IN Mayor Pete Buttigieg 45% – 44% Trump
• Former U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke (TX-16) 44% – 46% Trump

In stark contrast to assertions by GOPers and other naysayers of the Democratic party that economic conditions are favoring the GOP and Trump’s re-election, Mary Snow, a Polling Analyst for the Quinnipiac University Poll said that “More than half of Pennsylvania voters say they are better off financially than they were in 2016. But the economy isn’t giving President Donald Trump an edge in an early read of the very key Keystone State.”

Other general detractors to the Democratic party note with some sense of disdain that Vermont’s Independent Senator Bernie Sanders has called himself a “democratic socialist,” and seek to add credence to their argument by noting that some national-level GOP elected officials and others have said that “If we can run a race against a person that’s an out-of-the-closet socialist and promoting socialist ideas, it’s a great contrast for us.”

Donald Trump

Yet the poll also found that among respondents, 53% said “it is more important for a presidential candidate to be a great leader” while 38% said “it is more important for a candidate to have great policy ideas.” And that sets up an immediate turn away from policy to personality – a veritable cult of personality.

In the modern sense, the term “cult of personality” refers to a scenario in which

POTUS Obama: Sen. Warren is “absolutely wrong” on Trans-Pacific Partnership. But is she?

Editor’s Note: This article was originally written 11 May 2015, though unpublished. The TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership), is/was a “free-trade” pact among the nations of Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, Vietnam, and United States signed on 4 February 2016, though it was NOT ratified, and thus, did NOT take effect. All 12 members nations signed the TPP 4 February 2016.

However, because it was NOT ratified by all signatories before 4 February 2018, it will become effective ONLY after ratification when at least 6 nations with a combined GDP of more than 85% of the GDP of all signatories have signed.

Further, because the United States withdrew from the TPP, it also significantly and adversely affected it. The TPP agreement will become active only after all signatories have ratified it within two years of signing.

—//—

President Obama recently criticized Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren (D) for her clarion call warning of the potential damage the Trans-Pacific Partnership could do to United States’ economy.

Sen. Warren has said that “This is hardly a hypothetical possibility: We are already deep into negotiations with the European Union on a trade agreement and big banks on both sides of the Atlantic are gearing up to use that agreement to water down financial regulations.”

The President countered saying, “This is pure speculation. She and I both taught law school, and you know, one of the things you do as a law professor is you spin out hypotheticals. And this is all hypothetical, speculative.”

President Obama further dismissed her criticisms out of hand saying, “she’s absolutely wrong,” about the concerns she and others have raised, and appeared to throw down the gauntlet for open, frank discussion of the still-secret trade pact which would include Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States, and Vietnam.

The President gives the USTR broad power to keep secret information about the trade policies it advances and negotiates.

United States Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) said, “More than two months after receiving the proper security credentials, my staff is still barred from viewing the details of the proposals that USTR is advancing.”

A Senate bill – S. 3225 – which would require the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) to disclose all its TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership) documents to every member of Congress was introduced May 23, 2012 by Sen. Wyden, who is Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee’s Subcommittee on International Trade, Customs, and Global Competitiveness. In that capacity, his office is responsible for conducting oversight over the USTR and trade negotiations.

Speaking from the Senate floor, Sen. Wyden said the purpose of the bill was “to ensure that the laws and policies that govern the American people take into account the interests of all the American people, not just a privileged few. Congress passed legislation in 2002 to form the Congressional Oversight Group, or COG, to foster more USTR consultation with Congress. I was a senator in 2002. I voted for that law and I can tell you the intention of that law was to ensure that USTR consulted with more Members of Congress, not less.”

Golf Balls & Reality Teevee

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5tf7Ju9NBdk

Today, I saw a demonstration video of a toilet made by American Standard (⬆︎linked⬆︎above⬆︎). The company boasts that their Champion 4 model can flush 56 chicken nuggets effortlessly. They also advertise that it can flush 24 golf balls at once.

That’s what caught my attention – the golf balls.

Advertising toilets is much like advertising sanitary napkins or tampons – feminine hygiene products made to absorb menstrual blood flow. On teevee, they’re ALWAYS depicted as absorbing a blue liquid, which is most likely water with bluing added. Never red. Never. Perhaps the advertisers mean to suggest that if women purchase their branded products, they’ll become blue bloods.

Toilets are similarly depicted – never showing life’s reality. It’s just too… real.

So-called “reality” teevee is more surreal than real, especially when a naked man and woman are thrust together in a half-cocked scheme to “find” their way “back to” whatever version of reality from which they originated. There was a time when a naked man and naked woman put together would be finding other, better, more pleasant things to do rather than traipse across the countryside in their birthday suits.

Yet that’s what passes for “entertainment” these days. Never wonder why I’ve not owned a teevee for at least 10yrs.

But, back to the golf balls.

The American Standard Champion 4 model toilet is depicted in advertising as flushing two dozen golf balls in one flush.

That’s impressive, of course, but the thought that occurred to me was

Government Spending

About that “government spending” thing being a boost to the economy:

Yes, it’s true. We found that out early on, which was how our nation recovered from the Great Depression.

So… here’s the spending we need now (no, it’s not the “Green New Deal”) – INFRASTRUCTURE!!

Oh, and EVERY red cent that “we the people” spend through our government comes from the Private Sector.

Every material – raw or finished – and all manpower comes from the Private Sector; and only after public notices via competitive open (public) bidding.

Yeah. Think about that one for a while.

There is NO “government factory” in our nation. Never has been, never will be.

So, yeah… every four years, the American Society of Civil Engineers rates the overall quality of American economic infrastructure “in the familiar form of a school report card—assigning letter grades based on the physical condition and needed investments for improvement.”

In 2017, American Economic Infrastructure’s quality was graded as

Make America Great Again: A How-To Guide

Jim Cooper, a Democrat, is the US Representative for Tennessee’s 5th Congressional District.

Jim Cooper, who represents Tennessee’s 5th Congressional Distict, and is a Democrat, is also a Rhodes Scholar (economics & politics, Oriel College), and Harvard JD grad, after earning the BA in economics from UNC Chapel Hill.

He’s a fiscal conservative, and has long said that, because our government uses a cash accounting system (which is ILLEGAL for businesses to use), our government’s debt is very likely much larger than is estimated.

For that reason, he’s also long advocated changing the accounting method the United States government uses.

TN CD5 is essentially Davidson County (metro Nashville), and includes the adjoining Cheatham & Dickson counties to the WEST.

See:
https://www2.census.gov/geo/maps/cong_dist/cd113/cd_based/ST47/CD113_TN05.pdf

Oh… and as you might surmise, cutting taxes is NOT how to stimulate the economy. It is by government spending. Which is also why cutting taxes is a very bad idea, since it kills the goose that laid that golden egg. (This Internet thing came about by government spending, which has created an entirely new economy, and billionaires… and, it began as a DARPA research project. Just like GPS.)

As I continue to maintain,

our government is NOT “too big,”
it is MUCH TOO SMALL to be
either efficient,
or effective.

Think about what it’d be like going to a restaurant with a 100-seating capacity, finding it filled with patrons, and only one waiter and one cook. No one would get any service, and they’d be a fool to think otherwise.

That’s what has happened, and is continuing to happen to our government.

With very nearly 329,000,000 people, we are the THIRD LARGEST (most populous) nation on Earth – China ( 1,419,124,987) and India (1,365,986,094) are 1st & 2nd, respectively.

The GOP’s “starve the monster” approach to governance, i.e., kill/reduce/eliminate the source of the “monster’s food,” e.g., taxes, and you’re well on your way to a privatization scheme the likes of which neither our nation, nor the world has ever seen. Hopefully, that won’t happen. But, that’s what you get when Grover Norquist has said, “I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.”
– from an interview on NPR’s Morning Edition, May 25, 2001.

The SCOTUS gets FUCT – but not FCUK – for a day.

And based upon the outcome, we could get fuct for a lifetime.

Think about it…

Only 5ive people decide the fate of a nation with very nearly 329,000,000 people – which is the 3rd most populous nation on Earth.

5ive.

Just 5ive Justices, that is, who are appointed to life-time jobs – which, when first written, was NOT in the clause which states in Article III Section 1. that “The judicial power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behaviour, and shall, at stated times, receive for their services, a compensation, which shall not be diminished during their continuance in office.”

When the SCOTUS (Supreme Court of the United States) was formed by the Constitution in Article III, and after the first U.S. Census was taken in 1790, there were found to be 3,929,214 people in this land.

Fast forward 230 years.

In 2017, New York City’s estimated population was 8,622,698.
Los Angeles’ estimate was 3,999,759.

Chicago’s was 2,716,450.
Houston’s was 2,312,717.

Phoenix’ was 1,626,078.
Philadelphia was 1,580,863.
San Antonio was 1,511,946.

San Diego was 1,419,516.
Dallas was 1,341,075.
San Jose was 1,035,317.

So perhaps you’re beginning to get the point – and now you

Narcotrafficking: The Last Truly Free Market

Think about it… a massive global industry and multi-cultural international enterprise with tens, hundreds of thousands or perhaps even millions of employees, producers, distributors, wholesalers, retailers, and customers with ZERO Government regulation of any type, on anyone for any reason – no taxes, no regulatory oversight, nor requirements of any kind whatsoever, where a willing buyer and a willing seller meet each other.

And yet, the government seeks to eradicate it (even though their “efforts” have done exactly the opposite), by strengthening

Racism Rampant In The South

Rampant racism continues in our United States, especially and particularly in the South.

Or, so it seems.

One would’ve hoped for “a more perfect union,” especially by now.

But, that’s progress, and “progress” is a dirty word to many – especially to Southerners – whose loathsome contempt of, and resistance to change is as ignobly infamous as their Lost Cause (of the Confederacy) following defeat in our nation’s Civil War.

Curtis Flowers was tried for the SAME crime SIX times in Mississippi. If that doesn’t violate the intent of the “Double Jeopardy” clause of the Constitution, I don’t know what does. (Image from Mississippi Department of Corrections.)

Synopsis: A Mississippi Death Row inmate was prosecuted SIX times for the SAME crime by a prosecutor with a history of racial bias in jury selection.

The case was SO egregious, that the sole, long-silent Southerner, and only Black SCOTUS Justice, Clarence Thomas, who has for many years maintained literal silence on the bench, asked a question – the last question he asked was THREE YEARS AGO.

NPR wrote that arguments before the SCOTUS Justices in this case were “more passionate and fact-filled than usual.” (SCOTUS case transcript linked above, and here: SCOTUS case Curtis Giovanni Flowers v Mississippi 17-9572)

The case the Justices heard Wednesday, 20 March 2019, involved the conduct of Montgomery County District Attorney Doug Evans, in the tiny town of Winona, Mississippi, and his relentless pursuit of a conviction of Curtis Flowers.

With a population well under 5000, Winona is practically a village, and of the modestly-sized tiny town, NPR wrote that it’s a place “where everybody knows everybody.”

Curtis Giovanni Flowers is a black man who had NO prior arrests or convictions before he was arrested and accused of a quadruple murder in the town.

After Flowers’ arrest, he was

Alabama To Join Nursing License Compact

Hooray for Alabama!

Their legislature can always be counted upon to do the right thing… only after they’ve exhausted every other possibility.

Alabama State Representative April Weaver, a Republican from House District 49, representing parts of Bibb, Chilton, and Shelby counties, has introduced HB44, which “would allow the Board of Nursing to enter into the Enhanced Nurse Licensure Compact as a means of providing uniformity in licensing requirements and interstate practice throughout party states. This bill would also amend existing law to make technical corrections relating to the multistate licensure of nurses.”

For those unfamiliar with the eNLC, think of it like a Driver License.

Your license to drive is valid in 49 other states. And if you’re driving in another state and are given a traffic citation by any Law Enforcement Officer for a moving violation such as

Data: Legalized Marijuana Does Not Increase Alcohol Sales

Cannabis Producers in Washington state

Good news for cannabis legalization advocates!

“In the three states with the longest history of legalized recreational marijuana sales – Colorado, Washington state and Oregon – there is no evidence that legalization has had any impact on spirits sales, nor is there any evidence that it has impacted total alcohol sales.”

That’s according to research conducted by the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States (DISCUS).

In other words, cannabis legalization – neither recreational (nor medical) – has had no effect, either positive or negative, upon beverage alcohol sales in states were cannabis is legal, either for recreational, or medical purposes.

David M. Ozgo, Senior Vice President and Chief Economist of the Distilled Spirits Council analyzes market trends for DISCUS, and said in part that, “The data show there has been no impact on spirits sales from recreational marijuana legalization.”

David M. Ozgo, Senior VP and Chief Economist, Distilled Spirits Council of the United States

Mr. Ozgo also produces an annual spirituous beverage industry review, and provides tax and regulatory effect analyses, including

Close To Home: An Alabama Native was First to Hike the Entire US/Mexico Border

“Border Walk,” by Mark J. Hainds, an Andalusia, Alabama native, documents his journey as the first individual to have trekked along the 1954 miles of the US/Mexico border.

While the Washington Post is getting clicks on their news feature story headlined “Is the border actually lawless? This father and son are hiking all 1,954 miles to find out.,” it was actually Mark J. Hainds, an Andalusia, Alabama resident, who was the first person to have ever hiked the length of the US/Mexico border.

In November 2014, the Research Associate and Research Coordinator with Auburn University and the Longleaf Alliance, resigned his 20-year-plus positions, and took temporary leave of his family, to hike the 1,954 miles of the US/Mexico border.

PBS documented his journey in a full-length feature film named “La Frontera,” which can be viewed for free at the link below:

https://southdocs.org/project/lafrontera/

His book “Border Walk” which describes his journey, was published in March 2018, and in April he authored an article which was published on Daily Kos website (“I Walked the Entire US-Mexico Border”) about his journey which also referenced his book.

He leads that story by writing, “On November 24^th, 2017, I became the first person in history to have walked the length of the US-Mexico border.”

His feat was reported by:

• The Houston Chronicle in October 2016 (“A walk along the border: Man traverses Texas-Mexico line for documentary“)

• Vice in October 2016 (“We Talked to the Man Walking the Length of the US-Mexico Border“)

• The Associated Press April 2017 (“Day 14: Fellow border travelers meet, in the middle of nowhere“)

• The San Diego Tribune July 2017 (“For 700 miles, hiker kept the border in view, and on his mind“)

Healthcare, Marijuana, Medicare For All, Voting Rights, And More

This prospective legislation (linked below) is “…an indication of the overall appetite for progressive policies in the 2020 Democratic primary race.”

And, it’s about damn time!

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders -I

I’m sick & tired of hearing folks say that there’s not a nickel’s worth of difference between the Democrats and the Republicans. And face it… if it weren’t for Bernie leading the way last General Election cycle, we very likely wouldn’t be hearing this kind of talk. Seriously.

 

And, while Sen. Kamala Harris exceeded Bernie’s 2016 fundraising “haul” by raising $1.5M in the first 24 hours following announcement of candidacy, Bernie outdid himself this time by raising $6M in 24 hours. THAT is SIGNIFICANT! And, it says that the number of those who believed in him last time, have increased. Plus, he already has the campaign people and mechanisms in place, whereas others – including Harris – do not.

California Senator Kamala Harris -D

I think it’ll be interesting to see how all this shakes out.

Of course, Joe Biden’s likely to be tossed into the mix, but while polls show he has “favorable” ratings with many, including Republicans,

Flooding Rains Damage Alabama and Tennessee

America could build infrastructure to PREVENT tragedies like this from happening. And by “tragedy,” I mean to refer to the damage done in the wake of such climatological events – REGARDLESS of their causes, whether human-influenced, or not.

We once did build infrastructure, or rather, attempted to, after the Great Mississippi River Flood of 1927, when nearly 30,000 square miles of land along the lower portion of the Mississippi River was flooded to depths up to 30 feet, and stayed flooded to that extent for well over two months before receding. That natural disaster displaced well over 1.5 million people, and killed thousands directly and indirectly.

After that, Republican POTUS Calvin Coolidge refused to call a Special Session of the then-adjourned Congress, and rather than initiating governmental action, wanted to raise money to facilitate recovery efforts through bake sales, church raffles and private philanthropy, which he also thought should be dealt with at a local level, rather than Federal. It’s NO exaggeration to write that.

Obviously, that approach didn’t work. So Coolidge, who couldn’t be bothered to go and visit the people in the areas devastated, came under significant pressure for his lackadaisical do-nothing attitude, and assigned the task of “doing something” to then-Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover, who – though Stanford-educated as an infamously mediocre student who failed all the entrance exams but mathematics – had led food distribution efforts in post-WWI Europe.

Newspapers were not kind to Coolidge, and the Jackson Clarion-Ledger (in Mississippi) wrote, “It has been necessary to school President Coolidge day by day a bit more towards the realization of the immensity of the catastrophe.”

The Paducah News-Democrat (in Kentucky) wrote that Coolidge had either “the coldest heart in America or the dullest imagination, and we are about ready to believe he has both.”

The New York Times however, saw things differently only because they were unaffected, and wrote, “Fortunately, there are still some things that can be done without the wisdom of Congress and the all-fathering federal government.”

But the Chicago Tribune thought little of the hare-brained scheme, and instead headlined a story with “Coolidge Backs Gigantic Flood Control Scheme,” while their Editorial Board wrote, “Only the resources and jurisdiction of the federal government can cope with the task of flood control.”

Coolidge’s contempt for government was well-known, and he disparagingly said, “If the federal government were to go out of existence, the common run of people would not detect the difference.”

Instead of governmental action, the Coolidge White House started

Hoda Muthana

Can ANYONE tell me (or anyone else), exactly WTH is “a legal basis to return to the country” of one’s citizenship/origin?

Asking for a friend, you see.

Hoda Muthana, seated in the foreground, participates in a broadcasting class at Hoover High School in Hoover, Alabama, on August 18, 2011. (Image by Beverly Taylor/The Birmingham News)

Seriously.

If you’re born in the United States, it’s territories or protectorates, then you’re AUTOMATICALLY an American citizen. That includes Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, all U.S. Military bases worldwide, and here’s the list of U.S. protectorates:

American Samoa
Guam
Palau – While an autonomous nation, the United States provides defense, funding, social services, and the American dollar is the currency of exchange.
Puerto Rico
US Virgin Islands
Midway Atoll, Bikini Atoll, Johnston Atoll, Baker, Howard, Wake – all uninhabited islands

No questions asked… except by GOP whack-jobs, like “birthers” and other conspiracy theorists, who hallucinated after drinking the Libertarian kook-ade and concocted some hare-brained scheme to assert Barack Obama was born somewhere else, other than Hawaii.

So, yeah… New Jersey must not be a state, anymore.

And Alabama… well, it’s a state of mind – and a very sad one, at that.

Thank gawd for Mississippi, eh?

So it turns out that US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, aka “Pompous Ass #2,” recently (as in yesterday, 20February2019) wrote that

Economic Infrastructure Strained By Severe Weather And Climate Change

Increasingly, there’s a political tie-in to almost every news story published these days. And frankly, I’d much rather write about other, more benign, or even pleasant topics. But, these matters affect us all, and our very lives and livelihoods are at stake. So, because these are pressing matters, I give heed to them, as I hope you do also.

Recently, NPR News published a story while our nation was in the throes of the “Polar Vortex,” which is the name now given to a severe “cold snap” which plunged much of the Midwest and East into literally Arctic temperatures. In fact, as we we’re told by numerous meteorologists and other weather / climate scientists and researchers, the Arctic was actually warmer than many places affected, most notably including Chicago, the Twin Cities (Minneapolis–Saint Paul), Iowa, Pennsylvania, and other states up through the area, with some locales suffering from temperatures which dipped down into the -23ºF range, or lower. Many Low Temperature records were surpassed, and when combined with Wind Chill Factors, temperatures feel like at least double that (-40ºF), and more.

A Minnesotan is extremely bundled up protecting every square inch of exposed skin while awaiting public transportation outdoors during extremely dangerous cold conditions which occurred during the 2019 Polar Vortex.

By all estimates, it was one of the most severe such events in recorded history, and was also the cause of numerous deaths of people of all ages and sexes (21 at last count, not all who were homeless), due of course, to cold temperature extremes. Homeless shelters throughout the affected areas were literally accepting anyone and everyone, and numerous other organizations and agencies created emergency shelters for others to avoid the deadly conditions. Area residents were severely warned to avoid going outdoors at all costs, simply because inadequate dressing, or any exposed skin would certainly suffer frostbite, or worse.

But there was another, largely overlooked problem which was only given cursory attention. And that was the effects and strains the severe climatic conditions placed upon infrastructure, which is often called economic infrastructure.

Essentially, infrastructure describes a nation’s internal facilities that enable business activity, which are fundamental requirements for economic development, which is vital to improvements in a country’s standard of living, and consists of facilities, activities and services that assist to increase overall economic productivity at a national level.

Infrastructure has two broad component parts: 1.) Social Infrastructure, consisting of basic services such as education, training, including health, sanitation, potable water supply, housing, sewerage, etc., while; 2.) Physical Infrastructure directly supports economic production, and consists primarily of supporting the production and distribution of products and services including agriculture, industry, and trade, supports, and directly increases productivity.

An example of Physical Infrastructure would be the production of hydroelectric dams by the Tennessee Valley Authority, creation of electrical power, communication, and natural gas delivery grids, roads, waterways, airports and railways for transportation, and potable water and waste treatment plants and their related delivery mechanisms and systems.

All those components must not only be created and developed, but they must be continually maintained, and improved as necessary, to continue to provide services vital to the economy. And it is maintenance which proves frequently to be the

Trump’s Failed 2019 SOTU Shows GOP Contempt

Orenthal James “OJ” Simpson mug shot following his arrest for double murder 17 June 1994.

With Voter Dissatisfaction of the President at an all-time high, Trump’s government-shutdown-delayed, failed 2019 SOTU demonstrates his utter contempt of the GOP, and disgust for the American people.

About halfway through his alleged SOTU speech last night (Tuesday, February 5, 2019), I was expecting the POTUS to say something like “If the glove doesn’t fit, you must acquit,” which was the hackneyed pithy phrase that Defense Attorney Johnnie Cochran coined in his defense of Orenthal James “OJ” Simpson at the murder trial for Ron Goldman, and Nicole Brown Simpson, his estranged and former wife, and mother of their two children.

Later, of course, while found “Not Guilty” by a jury of his peers in that double murder trial, OJ Simpson was later found found liable for both deaths in a 1997 civil suit, and ordered by the court to pay $33.5 million in punitive damages to the Brown and Goldman families.

Next, he was evicted from his residence after defaulting upon the mortgage, and all his possessions – including his 1968 Heisman Trophy – were ordered to be publicly auctioned to pay court-ordered debts to the Goldman family.

Then, the house and land were sold, the purchaser razed the structures, and renumbered the address.

Thereafter, the Internal Revenue Service found he had evaded Personal Income Taxes, and owed over $700,000 dollars to the United States Treasury;
• The State of California California Franchise Tax Board found that he owed them $1.44 million in taxes and in response, placed a lien on his property;
• Was arrested February 2001 in Miami-Dade County, Florida and charged with simple battery and burglary of an occupied conveyance;
• After the FBI searched his residence, they found equipment that defrauded satellite television service providers, and he was sued in Federal Court;

First Official White House portrait, aka “the scowling portrait”

• Was arrested again in Miami-Dade County, Florida July 2002 for speeding through a manatee protection zone, and failing to comply with proper boating regulations;
• Was sued by satellite television network DirecTV, Inc. in March 2004 and accused in Federal Court of using illegal electronic devices to pirate their broadcast signals, and plead guilty;
• And in 2007 was found guilty of Kidnapping and Armed Robbery in Clark County, Nevada and imprisoned, with convictions upheld by the Nevada Supreme Court;
• And was granted parole 9 years later.

He also published a ghost written book in 2007 entitled “If I Did It,” which was not received well to critical review, and was thought by many to be a confession of sorts, and all royalties from the sales of that book were ordered by a court to be awarded to the Goldman family.

So yeah… perhaps it’s time to “OJ” the Liar-in-Chief POTUS Trump.

My opinion of the POS45’s 2019 SOTU was about the same as that of Republican Alabama senior Senator Richard Shelby, who

Virginia Governor Ralph Northam

The yearbook photo ruckus with the Virginia Governor is, in my estimation, totally blown out of proportion, and this Op-Ed succinctly expresses what’s being overlooked, which is the PRESENT -and- the TRACK RECORD.

Wallace and Dr. James Hood admire Hood’s University of Alabama, Ph.D in Higher Education Administration diploma at Wallace’s Montgomery, Ala., home May 19, 1997. Wallace denied Hood admission to the University of Alabama in 1963.

Alabama Gov. George C. Wallace, right, is shown at the Governor’s Mansion in Montgomery with a meeting between presidential hopeful Rev. Jesse Jackson in this July 21, 1987 photo. In the 1980s he renounced his segregationist views, and he won his last term as governor (1983-87) with support from black voters.

There’s a significantly vast difference between the photo under question, and the matter of Iowa Representative Steve King, whose words and actions are not merely oblique, but blatantly white supremacist / racist.

I think also about late former Alabama Governor George C. Wallace, who remains the only four-term Governor that State has ever had.

An August 26, 1994 photo of Wallace in an emotional moment as he shares a hug with friend Connie Harper at a celebration of his 75th birthday.

Several years following the 1972 assassination attempt upon him in Maryland, he campaigned for, and won re-election to an unprecedented fourth and final term in 1982 while wheelchair bound… and with the broad support of the African American voting community in the state, without whose support

Buffoon In Chief Threatens National Security

Trump Faults Spy Bosses As Break Widens Between What They Advise And What He Does https://www.npr.org/689938744

Can this buffoon be taken seriously anymore?

Frankly, he’s a genuinely serious threat to National Security.
Think of him as a domestic enemy. Seriously.

FBI Director Christopher Wray (left to right), CIA Director Gina Haspel, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and Lt. Gen. Robert Ashley, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, prepare to testify before the Senate intelligence committee on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, 1/29/2019.

On Wednesday, 30 January 2019, POS45 rejected the sworn testimony of our nation’s top intelligence leaders that Iran is still complying with the nuclear agreement from which POS45 withdrew our United States. In other words, he’s practicing hypocrisy.

His lies, bull-in-a-china-shop and my-way-or-the-highway authoritarian, heavy-handed approach to governing has not worked, and will not ever work. America doesn’t want a dictator, anymore than we want a king. Our government is comprised of people willing to get in, roll their sleeves up, and do the work TOGETHER that needs to be done, and has been done, and continues to be done to make America great and even greater.

To flippantly say

Poll: Trump Sucks Hind Tit

www.publicpolicypolling.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/PPP_Release_National_12219.pdf

Roger Stone Indictment – Read it here.

Roger Stone Federal Criminal Indictment raises more questions than it answers.

It has now become clear that GOP dirty trickster Roger Stone, may have worked with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, and Guccifer 2.0, an ostensible Russian hacking entity or operation which likely operated directly under the auspices of the Internet Research Agency, a Russian cyber counter-intelligence unit, aka “troll farm,” to influence the outcome of the 2016 General Election for GOP Presidential nominee Donald Trump.

Roger Stone is the same one who Bob Dole’s 1996 presidential campaign fired after discovery of a personal ad he and his wife had placed in “Local Swinger Fever” a swingers magazine & website. The ad read: “Hot,

Alabama Marijuana: Is there money in it?

Is there money to be made LEGALLY in Alabama from marijuana?

The short answer is, “YES.” There is significant money to be made in Legalizing, Taxing, and Regulating Cannabis in Alabama for Adult Recreational (ARU), and Medical Use (MMJ).

Figures are now coming in from Massachusetts showing sales volumes, and taxes after that state legalized, taxed, and regulated marijuana for Adult Recreational Use, and Medical Use, and the figures are amazing.

Simply put, the Cost:Benefit ratio of keeping cannabis illegal is prohibitive to society at every level, federal, state, and local. There is NO reasonable, rational reason to continue cannabis prohibition. It costs more fiscally and socially to maintain than there is benefit derived from it being illegal. Taxpayers are no longer willing to foot the bill to so stridently harm their fellow citizens for responsible use of a substance that research shows is significantly less harmful than either alcohol, or tobacco, and which even the DEA has acknowledged has not killed anyone, nor has ever been a cause of addiction.

Today’s most recent story in the Boston Globe by Felicia Gans about that state’s success after Legalizing, Taxing, and Regulating cannabis for ARU & MMJ is headlined “Nearly $24 million spent on recreational marijuana sales in first two months.”

Customers crowd into Theory Wellness in Great Barrington on January 11, 2019, the opening day of its recreational marijuana sales.

Say It: Madam President Kamala Harris

Kamala Harris, a seasoned and respected prosecutor first as San Francisco District Attorney, and then as state Attorney General, is now United States Senator from California, and campaigning for the Office of the President of the United States.

Already, the GOP Hate & Slander machine is cranking up.

National Review, once a respected conservative journal, has now become a tawdry yellow rag.

And sadly, Yahoo! News doesn’t prominently display that the hit-piece journo-job is an Op-Ed.

Furthermore, the author doesn’t mention that the first link is to yet another Op-Ed, that one in the “failing” New York Times.

And the “news” item to which they refer in the San Francisco Gate is well over 10 years old.

But moreover, if the level of “offense” to which they ostensibly refer was so severe, Prosecutor Harris would’ve faced professional censure, or worse.

And, she didn’t.

Furthermore, Superior Court Judge Anne-Christine Massullo who was overseeing the matter had authority to toss out over 40 cases allegedly affected, and to rule against any alleged professional misbehavior by Prosecutor Harris, and…

How the Sackler family, private owners of OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma, became America’s BIGGEST drug pushers.

NPR, along with a few other news reporting agencies, has today published a story detailing how the Sackler family – with an estimated net worth of $13 Billion and listed by Forbes as the 19th wealthiest family in the United States – whose privately-held Purdue Pharma falsified, neglected, and purposely withheld information, and aggressively peddled their habit-forming narcotic medication branded as “OxyContin” to physicians, hospitals, and medical colleges as an acceptable, even benign medication for pain relief, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Purdue Pharma President Richard Sackler, and wife Beverly are the biggest narco-traffickers in the United States.

In a 274 page filing, the Massachusetts Attorney General, Maura Healey, carefully detailed how the Sackler family carefully and deliberately manipulated, and crafted opportunities with Massachusetts’ legislators, regulators, and others, to sell increasing volumes of the narcotic medicine.

The documents state that in a 2-15-2011 email, after one week of prescriptions doubled the company’s profit forecasts, Richard Sackler wrote to the sales staff that “I had hoped for better results.”

Massachussetts Attorney General’s Office pre-hearing memo & exhibits

https://d279m997dpfwgl.cloudfront.net/wp/2019/01/Mass_AGO_Pre-Hearing_Memo_and_Exhibits.pdf

But here’s where an otherwise LEGAL pharmaceutical firm became complicit with international narco-traffickers and street-level drug pushers, rapidly escalated America’s Opioid Crisis, and in the process became equals with terrorists like al Qaeda and the Taliban.

The Massachusetts Attorney General Pre-Hearing memorandum cited a

Whose Idea Was The Wall?

Where’d the idea for “The Wall” come from?

Whose idea was it?

Left to right: Iowa Republican Representative Steve King; Steve Elliott, President of Grassfire.org; Representative Ed Royce, R-California; and Ron De Jong, communications director of Grassfire.org, in 2007, introducing a television ad that asked when a fence would be built along the border.

Aside from Pink Floyd, Steve King, Iowa’s Racist 4th District Republican Representative said in a March 2017 interview with Yahoo! News that, “I built that model more than 10 years ago because people were saying, ‘We can’t build it. It’s too hard.’ And so I just put the model together. I just put it together piece by piece to show them how easy it is to build a wall.”

“I’m not interested in being the construction company that does this, but my little old company has the capability to build a mile of it a day. And so, what I envision is, I want to ask President Trump, ‘How tall do you want it, and you take care of making it beautiful.’ I have also put together an estimate on this, and it’s sophisticated. It’s like six pages long. We could do it. We’re not asking to do it, but our company, I don’t have to hire an extra man. We’ve got enough people, especially in the wintertime, it’s a little slack and we could build it a mile a day.”

Steve King, Iowa’s Racist 4th District Representative

“One phrase in that long article has created an unnecessary controversy. That was my mistake.”
–Steve King, Iowa’s 4th Congressional District Republican Representative on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives speaking about public criticism of his comments made in a New York Times interview, published January 10, 2019

TRANSLATION: That’s like saying, “Oops! I said ‘jigaboo’ when I should’ve said ‘darkie’.”

Here, in context, is what he said:
“White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization — how did that language become offensive? Why did I sit in classes teaching me about the merits of our history and our civilization?”

Iowa US Rep Steve King speaks at The Family Leadership Summit 2015 in Des Moines, Iowa, a thinly veiled Evangelical political summit sponsored in part by the Helms School of Government at Liberty University. Over several years, Liberty has had their own problems with charges of racism, and the Helms is named after late North Carolina Jesse Helms, himself a notorious racist.

When Steve King speaks about preserving “Western culture” or “Western civilization,” along with an obsessive discussion of birthrates and abortion rates among different ethnic groups, those are

Stand FIRM, Mr. President! STAND FIRM!

Way to go Mr. President! Way to go!

Don’t let those little snowflakes push you around!

You tell Ann Coulter (the White Supremacist) and Rush Limbaugh (the drug addict) to go to Hell!

Aside from now being aged 72 years – making him the OLDEST president ever to ever accede to the office at age 70 (he’s fond of superlatives, you know, and Reagan was 69 when he became president) – he probably needs

The Liar Speaks Tonight

The Liar in Chief won’t tell his subjects these inconvenient official truths.

—//—

“While cross-border migrants often make headlines, the largest number of illegal migrants settling in the US each year is those who stay in the country after their visas expire.

“According to the most recent reports by the Department of Homeland Security and the Center for Migration Studies, a non-partisan think-tank, the number who overstayed their visas has outnumbered those who crossed the border illegally every year since 2007.

“Canadians make up the largest group of these illegal migrants, followed by Mexicans.”

www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-44319094

Republicans Started The Idea Of Government Shutdowns

The “Blame Game” is a popular political football not only in our nation’s capitol, but across the nation in statehouses. The “polarization” oft described by news outlets and “fake news” is a direct result of practices used by Republicans, which began in large part with Newt Gingrich.

You know, the Newt Gingrich who was the Georgia Republican having an extra-marital affair while trying to impeach then-President Clinton for a sexual tryst with White House Intern, Monica Lewinsky. Yes, the same Newt Gingrich who divorced his first wife (Jacqueline “Jackie” May Battley, who was his high school geometry teacher) while she lay in hospital recovering from cancer surgery while he was campaigning in hopes of becoming the GOP’s presidential nominee.

That’d be the same Newt Gingrich who next married a Congressional aide (28-year old Marianne Ginther) with whom he was philandering while married to his first wife Jackie, and asked her to marry him before having divorced his first wife, and then married Marianne a mere six months after divorcing Jackie, who also asked her (Marianne) if she would be interested in having an “open marriage” in which he could have a mistress and a wife.

And yes, it’s the same Newt Gingrich who in the exact same pattern, did the exact same thing when he married his third wife (Callista Bisek) by carrying on a six-year adulterous relationship with her, whom was also a Congressional aide, and then later moved to divorce his second wife Marianne after learning she had been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, and the third wife whom Trump later named as Ambassador to the Holy See, as an ultimate insult, and slap in the face to the Pope, the Vatican, and all that the Church believes in, and stands for. It’d be like naming neo-Nazi/White Supremacist/Holocaust denier to be Ambassador to Israel, or an industrialist to be Secretary of the Interior, or a climate change denier to be administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Wait…

That Newt Gingrich.

The same Newt Gingrich who wrote the so-called “Contract with America” which was broken the first day Republicans took the oath of office following their win of the House and Senate – the first time since 1953 – even though they all signed vows that stated “If we break this Contract, throw us out.”

Yeah.

THAT Newt Gingrich.

Now, the Bully in Chief is blaming Democrats because he can’t get his way – which is BILLIONS MORE for a “concrete, rebar-reinforced wall,” which has since devolved into “steel slats,” or even less, a simple “barrier.” Notice how things are changing already? Next thing you know, it’ll be a row of concertina wire spooled across the 1954 miles of U.S./Mexico border.

Frankly, it’d probably be much cheaper, not only in the immediate term, but in the long term, as well. You see, one of the things that NO ONE – not even the Congressional Budget Office, nor the Government Accountability Office – has studied is “how much the upkeep of ‘the wall’ will cost American taxpayers.

But here’s an even more disconcerting thing: The ever-shifting comments of the Current White House Occupant on the matter, which have ranged from this comment from a campaign speech given Tuesday, January 13, 2015 at his Trump Tower office building in Manhattan:

“I would build a great wall – and nobody builds walls better than me, believe me – and I’ll build them very inexpensively. I will build a great great wall on our southern border, and I’ll have Mexico pay for that wall.”

To one of his highnesses more recent Twitter rants which was:

“Mexico is paying for the Wall through the new USMCA Trade Deal. Much of the Wall has already been fully renovated or built. We have done a lot of work. $5.6 Billion Dollars that House has approved is very little in comparison to the benefits of National Security. Quick payback!” January 2, 2019

Are you starting to see a pattern here?

Promises.

Lies.

Broken promises.

More lies.

Say anything to get elected, or if you prefer, to get into Lady Liberty’s & America’s pants. The net effect is the same.

Look, I’m no fan of either Gingrich or Trump as human beings, and I think that Trump is vastly out of his league in any government, much less at the Federal level, and as President. He’s told more brazen lies than almost anyone can remember, and has sown confusion in our nation, which is not only demoralizing domestically, but makes us look like buffoons in the eyes of our international allies, and enemies. But, to give credit where credit is due, I think

Marijuana in Alabama: Show me the money!

How Much Money Could Alabama Earn By Legalizing, Taxing, and Regulating Marijuana?

How much money could Alabama stand to realize if it Legalized, Taxed, and Regulated (LTR) cannabis for Adult Recreational Use (ARU), and Medical Use (MMJ)?

In order to make a reasonably accurate estimate, we need certain pieces of information from reliably accurate sources, such as:

1.) How many people would purchase it?

2.) How much tax would be placed upon it?

3.) How frequently would they purchase?

There are other questions, but let’s start by answering those three.

First, let’s determine how many people consume marijuana in the state – adults, of course.

The National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), is an annual survey which first began in 1971 and is conducted in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. It’s conducted under the auspices of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality.

“I now call the House to order on behalf of all of America’s children.”

Having just been administered the Oath of Office for an historic second time, Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi D-CA12, gavels the House to order saying, “I now call the House to order on behalf of all of America’s children.”

Nancy Pelosi of California, a Democrat from that state’s 12th District has made history again not only as the first female Speaker of the House of Representatives, but as the first woman to have ever been twice Speaker of the House. She further joins an even more rarefied group – 7 Speakers who were re-elected to the position, i.e. having served nonconsecutive terms.

The 116th Congress is historic for several other reasons, not just because of

Presidential Indictment

“The people… My people are so smart. And you know what else? They say about my people – the polls? They say I have the most loyal people. Did you ever see that? Where I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody! And I wouldn’t lose any voters. Okay? It’s like incredible! No… they say ‘Trump’ – we love you too, man – ‘Trump’s voters are by far’… You know the ah… I’m at 68, 69%. I’m at 90% – total. Like, ‘will you say “absolutely”?’ I think it’s 68 or 69%. Will you most likely say… That gets into the 90’s. Other guys are at like 10. A guy like Jeb Bush? He has nobody! But he’s like…at… at… I mean, like… they don’t have people! They have nothing! Ahh… Rubio? Soft. They’re all… all soft. All soft. My people? Stay. Ah, by the way, Cruz? Soft!”

Ex-NYC Top Cop: Pot “Addictive”

Bill Bratton, Ex-NYC Top Cop, Says Pot “Addictive”

Former New York City Police Commissioner William “Bill” Bratton appeared on a Sunday call-in interview on the radio show “The Cats Roundtable with John Catsimatidis” on WNYM 970 AM (Hackensack, NJ) recently, and was asked about his thoughts on the legalization of cannabis in New York State for Adult Recreational Use (ARU).

William “Bill” Bratton, was NYC’s Police Commissioner 1994-96, 2014-16, and LAPD Chief 2002-2009

He said in part that, “At this particular time, I still strongly oppose it. I think there are too many unanswered questions. We still don’t have effective capabilities in law enforcement to deal with the issue of driving while impaired by the use of marijuana. It is as addictive as any other drug. We don’t really know the full effect of that drug on the development of children. I guarantee that about the same as alcohol is very available to young people, marijuana – particularly the way it’s being proposed in this state in terms of allowing people to grow it in their homes, as well as the widespread distribution of it – young people will be getting their hands on it. There’s the compounding feature of the smell of it. Nobody wants to live in a building, in an apartment building, a public housing project, on the streets, in the parks, with the pervasive smell, which you’ve already started to see an increase in the use of it on the streets. The enforcement lessons of… (unintelligible) There are too many unknowns. And, ah… ” etc.

Fortunately for you, dear reader, I’ve researched the matter, and can address just about all his questions.

He claimed that: