"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."
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, March 31, 2023
Statistically, there are two extremes on the bell curve (the left and the right), and they both resemble each other. In fact, the bell curve itself — so named because its outline shape resembles a bell — is a mirror image of itself. Both halves are identical.
At the far end on either side, there’s very few of the thing being measured, or counted.
But, up in the middle, is where most everything is located.
It’s the same way with politics.
And guns.
Some say ban them all — but up in the middle is where consensus is found — while others say do nothing.
The Volunteer State and the nation are grieving over the deaths of three 9-year old children, and 3 adults gunned down at The Covenant School, a private Christian elementary school in Nashville’s Green Hills district. The world has taken notice not only the victims’ deaths, but of the heroic actions of Nashville’s Metro Police Department, whose members were on scene and resolved the problem in 15 minutes. Such quick action undoubtedly saved lives. They are to be commended beyond measure, and deservedly should be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, our nation’s highest civilian honor, perhaps even the Congressional Gold Medal.
Even the Babylon Bee, an online satire magazine stepped up to the fore and acknowledged MPD’s bravery, by Tweeting an article about it: “Putin Immediately Surrenders After U.S. Airdrops Nashville Police Officers Into Battlefield.”
Putin Immediately Surrenders After U.S. Airdrops Nashville Police Officers Into Battlefield https://t.co/ZUb9rf0EaW
Two former Tennessee Governors — Phil Bredesen, a Democrat, and Bill Haslam, a Republican, the 48th, and 49th Governor, respectively, who are friends — co-authored an Op-Ed published March 31 in The Tennessean, on the necessity of state, and Federal, lawmakers to collaborate to help bring about an end to the preventable tragedies of school shootings.
Both men share several similarities — both men were Mayor of a major Tennessee city, Bredesen of Nashville, Haslam of Knoxville, both men were re-elected as governor, both men are entrepreneurs, and very wealthy — and for the past year, they have both co-hosted a podcast at the Howard H. Baker, Jr. Center for Public Policy at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Howard Baker (1925-2014) was a long-time Republican U.S. Senator from Tennessee (1967-1985), who was renown for his pithy axiom, “Always remember that the other fellow might be right.”
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, November 7, 2022
The $12 million man who lives on a yacht docked on the Potomac River, the Democratic Senator from West Virginia, Joe “Maserati” Manchin III, should just shut his whiny yap.
When Henry Ford invented the mass-produced Model T, doubtless there were people whining about losing their jobs in the buggy whip factories, including the factories’ owners.
The thing is, however, that Henry Ford paid VERY WELL, much more so than many others at the time. And for that reason, many sought to work in his factories… and did.
So when yacht-living-large Multi-Millionaire Maserati Manchin starts crying about coal, or jobs lost through advancement of scientific technology, it’s hardly worth noting. And yet, if it weren’t for the Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, August 25, 2022
Contrary to what some political pundits, prognosticators, soothsayers, and talking heads say, Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate race has not “turned ugly.”
It has always been ugly.
Keystone State residents are faced with what has, once again, become a sad reality across this nation:
An extremely wealthy GOPer faces off against the Common Man.
And in that process, the GOPer merely shows their true colors. But unlike the true colors in Cindi Lauper’s song by that same title, they’re not beautiful. They’re grotesquely hideous, and a maliciously macabre mockery.
The nation saw it in Georgia with Kelly Loeffler, the unarguably wealthiest individual ever to warm a seat in the U.S. Congress — House, or Senate — whose financial net worth, with her husband Jeffrey Sprecher, owner and CEO of the New York Stock Exchage, was then valued at upwards of $800 million.
In fact, under Trump’s tax law changes, the entire purchase price of a new or used aircraft bought by a company can be a 100% tax deductible write-off against its earnings.
What the multi-millionairess did, was to create an “ownership trust,” which is a company that owns the plane, rather than herself personally. By so doing, it offers some degree of anonymity by giving it the appearance of being isolated from the individual(s) whom actually control it. Essentially, it’s a type of “shell company” set up exclusively for the purpose of ownership, and nothing else.
Tripp is an alum of the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and one would expect more from a university-educated woman like her, and certainly much, much, more from the one who hired her — Oz, a very wealthy (as in multimillionaire wealthy) retired cardiologist. Of course, Oz has his own baggage, but the difference is, he doesn’t carry his own luggage — he has a porter to carry it for him.
But Tripp’s remark not only shows ignorance, it shows Oz’s true colors… his yellow belly, and forked tongue.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, August 17, 2021
Soprano Amalie Materna (1844-1918) as the character Brünnhilde in Richard Wagner’s “Der Ring des Nibelungen” at Bayreuth, Germany, 1876 – conjectural origin of the idiom “when the fat lady sings.”
What can anyone say about people that will cling to the body of a jet aircraft as it takes off, and then as it begins to reach altitude, fall to their deaths? Or stow away in a wheel well, where they are crushed by the mechanisms, or freeze to death at altitude?
Morons.
And desperate.
But still, morons.
They are utterly lacking common sense, stupid, and fundamentally absent the knowledge or intelligence to understand that such actions would be fool hardy at best, and – as it turned out – fatal at worst.
What would you say?
How would anyone describe it?
And yet, “it ain’t over ’til the fat lady sings.”
So goes a colloquial saying meaning “don’t count your chickens until the eggs are hatched.”
Speaking of eggs, they can’t be unscrambled.
And this matter may very well be exactly illustrative of that axiom.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, June 17, 2021
PREDICTION:
Cannabis WILL be legalized within the next 6 – 8 months at the Federal level.
As state after state, and nation after nation is legalizing or decriminalizing cannabis in one form, or another, the United States is facing a decision which was made nearly 100 years ago to make illegal a practically harmless substance, which itself has shown, and continues to show significant promise for the amelioration of serious disease, malady, and human suffering.
According to the Drug Enforcement Administration, in their 2017 “Drugs of Abuse” report,
“No deaths from overdose of marijuana have been reported.”
The National Cancer Institute has written that it’s impossible to overdose on cannabis, because our body’s cannabinoid receptors — the chemicals that bind to THC — are not located in areas of the brainstem that control respiration. For that reason, a “lethal dose” of cannabis is like the flying spaghetti monster: It DOES NOT EXIST.
In stark contrast, the CDC has stated in January 2018 that
In 1972, the Schaffer Commission, officially, the National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse, issued a report entitled Marihuana: A signal of misunderstanding which was the first report by the United States Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse, was largely dismissive of specious claims that there was danger in its use, and recommended ending marijuana prohibition and adopting other methods to discourage use.
Specifically, it debunked false claims made about cannabis, and found that, contrary to earlier assertions made about during efforts to keep it illegal,
“marihuana was usually found to inhibit the expression of aggressive impulses by pacifying the user.”
It stated further that,
“neither informed current professional opinion nor empirical research, ranging from the 1930’s to the present, has produced systematic evidence to support the thesis that marihuana use, by itself, either invariably or generally leads to or causes crime, including acts of violence, juvenile delinquency or aggressive behavior.”
Another infamously false claim that marijuana use caused “insanity,” was similarly debunked, and the Commission wrote that
“previous estimates of marihuana’s role in causing crime and insanity were based on quite erroneous information.”
They even warned that
maintaining cannabis’ illegal status
“carries heavy social costs”
and that
“the better method {to discourage its use}
is persuasion
rather than prosecution.”
And in fact, they wrote that “we reject the total prohibition approach and its variations” and instead recommended “a decriminalization of possession of marihuana for personal use on both the state and federal levels.”
A portion of their recommendation was regulation, and wrote in part that “by establishing a legitimate channel of supply and distribution, society can theoretically control the quality and potency of the product.”
Of course, none of the recommendations were followed, and instead, Nixon, the paranoid president who maintained an “enemies list” (and recorded conversations, and narrowly missed criminal indictment, for which reason he resigned the Presidency), initiated his now-infamously-failed “War on Drugs,” and kept marijuana listed on Schedule I.
Nixon’s Domestic Policy Advisor, John Erlichman (1925-1999), was quoted by Dan Baum in Harper’s Magazine April 2016, and said the following of Nixon’s War on Drugs:
“The Nixon campaign in 1968,
and the Nixon White House after that,
had two enemies:
The antiwar left and Black people.
You understand what I’m saying?
We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be
either against the war or Black,
but by getting the public to
associate the hippies with marijuana
and Blacks with heroin,
and then criminalizing both heavily,
we could disrupt those communities.
We could arrest their leaders,
raid their homes,
break up their meetings,
and vilify them night after night on the evening news.
Did we know we were lying about the drugs?
Of course we did.”
Such statements seem to very clearly suggest that laws prohibiting cannabis consumption were left in place for one purpose alone, and that is to use the instrument of law to keep under foot those who might be socially undesirable – most notably, the poor, and ethnic minorities – and that is an egregious abuse of law, and contradicts almost every idea of equality under law in our Constitution.
Our Federal government, along with State and Local governments, regulates and taxes beverage Alcohol and Tobacco (which is 2/3 of the ATF’s name), and does so successfully, and in the process, generates significant revenue for all three levels of governments. Along with that, entrepreneurial enterprises in those two industries hire almost countless numbers of people, and generate significant revenue nationally, and globally through export.
The Libertarian think-tank Cato Institute, in their statement which decries that which they call the “nanny state,” quotes late, former POTUS Ronald Reagan in former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan’s book “The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World,” as having said, “Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves.” (Penguin Press, Chapter 4, (p. 87), 2007.)
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, April 19, 2021
Former Vice President Walter F. Mondale, photographed at his Mill District condo on April 30, 2019, in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
In 2007, former-Vice President Walter “Fritz” Mondale (1928-2021) was asked to describe his proudest accomplishment in President Jimmy Carter’s administration.
He said, “We told the truth, we obeyed the law, and we kept the peace. It may not sound like much, but if you’ve got that, you can handle the rest.”
Fritz Mondale died peacefully in his sleep, April 19, 2021, of natural causes, surrounded by family, at his Minneapolis, Minnesota home, aged 93.
“Through his work as a Senator, he showed me what was possible. He may have been modest and unassuming in manner, but he was unwavering in his pursuit of progress; instrumental in passing laws like the Fair Housing Act to prevent racial discrimination in housing, Title IX to provide more opportunities for women, and laws to protect our environment. There have been few senators, before or since, who commanded such universal respect.
“He not only created a path for himself, he helped others do the same. Walter Mondale was the first presidential nominee of either party to select a woman as his running mate, and I know how pleased he was to be able to see Kamala Harris become Vice President.
“In accepting the Democratic Party’s nomination for President, he described the values he was taught to live by: “to play by the rules; to tell the truth; to obey the law; to care for others; to love our country; to cherish our faith.”
“As a Senator, an Ambassador, a Vice President, and a candidate for President, he lived and spread those values.”
Then-former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter, LEFT, and Vice Presidential running mate Minnesota Senator Walter Mondale celebrate Democratic primary victories at Mondale campaign headquarters in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on March 13, 1984.
Walter Mondale made history by being the first candidate of any party to name a female as a Vice Presidential running mate.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, January 21, 2021
On his Inauguration Day, following taking the Oath of Office, President Biden kept his campaign promise, signed at least 15 Executive Orders and other executive directives, all designed to protect American citizens from abuses of various types, to bring America back into accord with its international neighbors, and to begin strengthening the weaknesses created by the previous failed administration.
The first three Executive Orders were signed on camera from a room adjoining the Oval Office for such purposes.
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, April 27, 2020
If you, your loved ones, or someone you know, needs, or wants to be tested for COVID-19, GO GET TESTED AT NO COST TO YOU!
THIS IS A MATTER OF PUBLIC HEALTH!!
And, EVERYONE IS AT RISK – not just the elderly, infirm, or those with other health conditions – EVERYONE!
Representative Porter questioned Dr. Redfield in committee on Capitol Hill March 12, and as a long-time consumer advocate attorney, discovered the law provides that CDC Director has FULL AUTHORITY to “authorize payment for the care and treatment of individuals subject to medical examination, quarantine, isolation, and conditional release…”
(a) The Director may authorize payment for the care and treatment of individuals subject to medical examination, quarantine, isolation, and conditional release, subject to paragraphs (b) through (h) of this section.
“So the next time you hear me attacked as a socialist, remember this:
“I don’t believe government should own the means of production, but I do believe that the middle class and the working families who produce the wealth of America deserve a fair deal.
“I believe in private companies that thrive and invest and grow in America instead of shipping jobs and profits overseas.
“I believe that most Americans can pay lower taxes – if hedge fund managers who make billions manipulating the marketplace finally pay the taxes they should.
“I don’t believe in special treatment for the top 1%, but I do believe in equal treatment for African-Americans who are right to proclaim the moral principle that Black Lives Matter.
“I despise appeals to nativism and prejudice, and I do believe in immigration reform that gives Hispanics and others a pathway to citizenship and a better life.
“I don’t believe in some foreign “ism”, but I believe deeply in American idealism.
“I’m not running for president because it’s my turn, but because it’s the turn of all of us to live in a nation of hope and opportunity not for some, not for the few, but for all.
“No one understood better than FDR the connection between American strength at home and our ability to defend America at home and across the world. That is why he proposed a second Bill of Rights in 1944, and said in that State of the Union:
““America’s own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for all our citizens. For unless there is security here at home there cannot be lasting peace in the world.”
“I’m not running to pursue reckless adventures abroad, but to rebuild America’s strength at home. I will never hesitate to defend this nation, but I will never send our sons and daughters to war under false pretense or pretenses or into dubious battles with no end in sight.”
– Vermont U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, Georgetown University, November 19, 2015
The word ‘socialism’ has been used for many years as a fear tactic to persuade people to do, or not do, what the one who is using the word wants them to do, or not do. It’s been around at least as long as since 1931 – and likely, much longer. Perhaps 20 years, or more.
A cursory search of the Congressional Record (part 1 volume 45, p270) showed that in the 1910 Congress, in the Second Session, on December 20, Representative Frank Wheeler Mondell (1860-1939), a Republican, said in part the following:
“Advanced with the extraordinary argument that to take authority from the people locally and lodge it with a federal bureau is “saving” something for “all the people” and from the” interests,” and backed by the demand of a certain section of the press, inspired by socialistic government bureaus, the propaganda has much influence with some legislators.”
Demonizing “the press,” demonizing “socialistic government bureaus,” and claiming it’s all “propaganda.”
Wow.
That stuff reads like it was ripped from today’s headlines in 2020, over 110 years later.
Grand OLD Party, indeed.
Same… tired… old… rhetoric.
But, let’s continue searching in that year’s record.
Senator Porter McCumber (1858-1933), a Republican from Nebraska, addressed that body on February 4, 1910 and as found on page 1481, is recorded to have said in part, Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Saturday, February 29, 2020
Try as they might, pundit and naysayers of most all stripe continue to castigate, demonize, and mischaracterize Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders as a “socialist” in the “classical” sense.
The “classical” sense, or definition of “socialism” is when a government controls the means -and- the method of production. Period. End of conversation.
In the United States, there has NEVER been, nor will there ever be, any “government factory.”
So, there’s that to consider.
But, think about the coins and currency (money) in your pocket.
You might have an argument for calling it “socialist,” because it’s
• made by the government,
• on government-owned machines,
• using government-owned paper, ink, and metals,
• by government employees, and is effectively
• owned by the government (on temporary “loan” to you, though it is in actuality, a promissory note, itself – but monetary theory is a topic for discussion another day).
BUT… the reason it’s NOT socialist is that EVERYTHING – the inks, the metals, the papers, the stamping and printing machines… EVERYTHING – was obtained by Publicly Bid Open Contracts FROM THE PRIVATE SECTOR.
Yeah.
So, there’s also that to consider.
And then, there’s our military… which issues official government-owned uniforms to government employees, who work using government-owned equipment, and their healthcare – which is given at NO COST TO THEM -and- TO THEIR FAMILY MEMBERS – using government-owned equipment, in government-owned healthcare facilities and hospitals, with government-owned-and-provided medicines.
And, in that scenario, the government employees control the means –and– the method of production, per se. It’s a “socialist” system if ever there was one!
But,, once again, ALL of those materials, and all the manpower to perform ALL those functions COMES FROM THE PRIVATE SECTOR via Publicly Bid Open Contracts.
Yeah.
So, there’s that to consider, as well.
Guess it must not be “socialism,” eh?
At least since 1931 (and likely at least 20 years or so earlier), the great “demon” of socialism has been a source of name-calling and fear-baiting in government.
The word “socialism” has been tossed around more than a Caesar’s Salad with oil and vinegar dressing. And, it’s only done for political hay-making purposes. In other words, it’s much like “The Boy Who Cried ‘WOLF!'”
Here are two examples from the Congressional Record of 1931:
Congressional Record–Senate, 28Feb1931, p6448
You see, in October 1917, something happened in Russia, and that country changed its name, which included the word “socialist” in it. Thereafter, it was easy to demonize the word, simply because of association with what happened in Russia.
The “something” that happened in Russia was the “October Revolution,” (i.e., the Russian Revolution) in which Vladimir Lenin (1870-1924) and his merry band of men (mostly) known as the Bolsheviks, overthrew the Russian government, which at the time had been long ruled by Czars from the Romanov family, the royal family of Russia – which was a 300-year long imperial dynasty (the 2nd in Russian history), and one of ineptitude, nepotism, incompetence, excess, corruption, and hubris – which in all fairness, also included a few successes, but exceedingly few.
Congressional Record – House 2March31 p6850
It was actually the 2nd (or 3rd, depending upon what source you read) that year, with the first being in March (or February, again, depending upon what source you read). An earlier revolution in 1905 had also happened, and the situation and circumstances of the that revolution was culminated in the 1917 revolutions. Riots, work stoppages, strikes, food shortages, economic upheaval, lack of industrialization, were almost commonplace, and social upheaval was in the air, and in the hearts and minds of Russian civilians.
In the early 1900’s, Russia was one of the most impoverished nations in the world, and most European countries, and did much of the world, viewed Russia as being a backwards, and undeveloped nation, which was also plagued with high poverty, among other social ills. It was only a relatively few years earlier, in 1861, that serfdom had been made illegal in Russia, though it had been illegal in Europe for much longer.
“Serfdom” is a practice of the landed gentry (wealthy real estate/properly owners) in which indentured servitude of the lowest social class members, called “serfs,” occurred, though which the impoverished serfs were in some way indebted to the land owner, typically in exchange for the privilege of working a plot of land for their own purposes, which in more modern times in America is called share-cropping. After serfdom was outlawed, the former serfs had freedom to organize, and they did.
Industrialization, which occurred much later in Russia than in other nations, was the harbinger of significant social change. Between 1890 and 1910, the populations of the well-known cities St. Petersburg, and Moscow, doubled in size. Such overcrowding brought along other social ills such as destitute living conditions for industrial workers, and with it, disease.
Decisions to grow agricultural products in the harsh northern Russian climes were similarly fraught with difficulty, and production was stymied, which in turn brought about food shortages, and their accompanying ills. In conjunction with the Crimean War (1854-56) arising from Russian pressure on Turkey which directly threatened British commercial and strategic interests in the Middle East and India, combined with Russian involvement in other armed conflicts (notably with Japan), their economy was brought to a practical stand-still.
The “Bloody Sunday Massacre” of unarmed peaceful protestors by government troops in St. Petersburg on January 22, 1905, set the stage for even greater civil unrest shortly thereafter.
THE POINT BEING…
History is full of events of people revolting when food and housing – 2 of the 3 most fundamental human needs of food, clothing, and shelter – cannot be obtained.
The same thing happened in the United States, albeit with less violence, during the Great Depression.
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, aka “FDR”, and his administration, sought to do everything humanly possible to PREVENT another occurrence of a “Great Depression” by correcting laws that led to the problem.
In the years since, Republicans (mostly), have done their damndest to tear down, and destroy everything FDR accomplished – including their wet-dream of privatizing Social Security – in order to hand it over to Wall Street speculators, who are salivating like hungry dogs to get their greedy hands on The People’s money.
As evidence of mostly Republican effort (though in all fairness, some Democrats have been involved, as well – aka “establishment Democrats,” or Wall Street Democrats In Name Only, or DINOs) to tear down the laws and rules protecting the people, look at the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act (repeal and replaced by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act – 145 pages, and signed into law by President CLINTON in 1999, the Glass-Steagall Act passed in 1933, signed by FDR, was 37 pages in length, and forbade the commingling of money from Insurance companies, Stock Brokerage houses, and Banks, i.e., each industry could not perform the roles which the others did), which led DIRECTLY to the “Great Recession” during the George W. Bush administration, in which numerous “too-big-to-fail” banks collapsed, insurance companies went under, people lost jobs, and automobile manufacturers requested a bail-out… while the people got no bail-out.
Following, are the transcribed remarks made by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders at Georgetown University November 19, 2015 about what he means when he mentions “democratic socialism.”
––––––––––––––••••––––––––––––––
––––––––––––––••••––––––––––––––
––––––––––––––••••––––––––––––––
In his inaugural remarks in January 1937, in the midst of the Great Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt looked out at the nation and this is what he saw.
He saw tens of millions of its citizens denied the basic necessities of life.
He saw millions of families trying to live on incomes so meager that the pall of family disaster hung over them day by day.
He saw millions denied education, recreation, and the opportunity to better their lot and the lot of their children.
He saw millions lacking the means to buy the products they needed and by their poverty and lack of disposable income denying employment to many other millions.
He saw one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished.
And he acted. Against the ferocious opposition of the ruling class of his day, people he called economic royalists, Roosevelt implemented a series of programs that put millions of people back to work, took them out of poverty and restored their faith in government. He redefined the relationship of the federal government to the people of our country. He combatted cynicism, fear and despair. He reinvigorated democracy. He transformed the country.
Bernie Sanders delivers his long-awaited speech on Democratic Socialism at Georgetown University. He also speaks about his vision for bringing American foreign policy into the 21st century.
And that is what we have to do today.
And, by the way, almost everything he proposed was called “socialist.” Social Security, which transformed life for the elderly in this country was “socialist.” The concept of the “minimum wage” was seen as a radical intrusion into the marketplace and was described as “socialist.” Unemployment insurance, abolishing child labor, the 40-hour work week, collective bargaining, strong banking regulations, deposit insurance, and job programs that put millions of people to work were all described, in one way or another, as “socialist.” Yet, these programs have become the fabric of our nation and the foundation of the middle class.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, January 17, 2020
Abby Phillip, CNN
To anyone watching, it was as plain as the nose on your face.
I’m neither a CNN fan, nor a CNN hater.
But this is blatant, and inexcusable.
It demonstrates an utter lack, and wholesale abandonment of professional journalistic integrity.
It wasn’t merely the Democrats or Progressives who noticed, either.
In fact, voices from the Conservative Right Wing were the loudest to decry the moderator Abby Phillip’s action.
I mean to refer to the 7th Democratic Debate held at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa this past Tuesday evening, 14 January 2020.
For some, it was analogously like the 7th Level of Hell in Dante’s Inferno, which was also full of violence toward individuals, and the Earth.
Though there were no fisticuffs, no bomb threats, no armed shooters, and no physical violence of any kind, there was another killing – two, in fact.
One, was CNN, which along with Moderator Abby Phillip, burned her journalism career, and the last shred of respectability or integrity CNN had remaining.
The other was Bernie Sanders.
It was obvious from the get-go.
Corporate interests in America do NOT want to see him win the Democratic Nomination for President.
Brianne Pfannenstiel, Chief Politics Reporter, The Des Moines Register, Iowa
“During the seventh round of Democrat debates Tuesday, CNN moderator Abby Phillip asked a shameful question that accused Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., of saying a woman could not win the 2020 election.”
The Chicago Tribune’s John Kass, another conservative columnist, also laid into CNN and Abby Phillip over her unethical journalistic behavior.
His remarks from his column, in part, are found below.
Even Rolling Stone magazine’s Matt Taibbi found Abby Phillip’s disrespectful treatment of Bernie Sanders to be not merely a cheap shot, but a calculated and active interference to sway viewers’ opinion.
The 24-hour network combines a naked political hit with a cynical ploy for ratings.
“This time, the whole network tossed the mud. Over a 24-hour period before, during, and after the debate, CNN bid farewell to what remained of its reputation as a nonpolitical actor via a remarkable stretch of factually dubious reporting, bent commentary, and heavy-handed messaging.
“The cycle began with a “bombshell” exposé by CNN reporter MJ Lee. Released on the eve of the debate, Lee reported Warren’s claim that Sanders told her a woman couldn’t win in a December 2018 meeting.
[These banal meanderings] “continued during the debate, with the chryon featuring questions like, “How will [Sanders] avoid bankrupting the country?” Or: “Does Sanders owe voters an explanation of how much his health plan will cost them and the country?””
CNN’s Chief Political Correspondent, Dana Bash, carried the ball over the line for the anti-Bernie Corporate Democrats – who were all assembled at CNN, including former DNC chair and commentator Terry McAuliffe, Clinton communications person Jess McIntosh, and former senior adviser to Barack Obama David Axelrod – and immediately after the debate concluded she said, “Do [voters] want a Bernie Sanders anti-interventionist, or do they want somebody who has experience and who has — as I’m sure you will hear behind us — voted for things like the Iraq war and maybe has made other decisions that he doesn’t regret and has been a leader on national security, but also has some that he does?”
Then McIntosh said this: “I think what Bernie forgot was that this isn’t a he said/she said story. This is a reported-out story that CNN was part of breaking. So, to have him just flat-out say no, I think wasn’t — wasn’t nearly enough to address that for the women watching.”
In her story for the Examiner, Breaking News Reporter Madison Dibble wrote in part that, “A moderator from the CNN/Des Moines Register debate sided with Elizabeth Warren in the he-said-she-said dispute over whether Bernie Sanders said a woman couldn’t be president.
“Abby Phillip, a CNN reporter, phrased her questions in defense of Warren, who claimed that Sanders told her he didn’t think a woman could be president during a meeting in 2018. The Vermont senator has denied that he ever said such a thing, but Phillip worded the questions as though there were evidence backing up Warren’s claim.”
Even POTUS Trump sees it.
They are rigging the election again against Bernie Sanders, just like last time, only even more obviously. They are bringing him out of so important Iowa in order that, as a Senator, he sit through the Impeachment Hoax Trial. Crazy Nancy thereby gives the strong edge to Sleepy…
POS45’s follow-up Tweet read, “….Joe Biden, and Bernie is shut out again. Very unfair, but that’s the way the Democrats play the game. Anyway, it’s a lot of fun to watch!”
Democratic political strategist Donna Brazile, who helped Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign, was later discovered to have been pilfering debate questions ahead of time, and sharing them with Hillary, with the intent to defeat Bernie. Like Roger Stone, she remains unrepentant for her misdeeds. CNN also fired her for that activity. But CNN wasn’t the only one.
Fox News also showed Brazile the door with the left foot of fellowship.
Vice-President of Fox Ethics, Satya Martin, described Brazile’s firing:
“Donna Brazile is the worst reporter or commentator or whatever she is that I’ve ever known.
Her only goal, it seems, is to be contrary.
She literally claims opposite supposed ‘facts’ to everything that we report in the news. And her opinions are over the top in their opposition.
She’s like a child who just screams in tantrums against us for attention.
“She was fired from CNN for fabricating stories so she was already known as a purveyor of fake news.
The brass had their reasons for taking a chance on her.
I’m sure they wanted to attract a liberal audience just to show that we mean it when we say we’re fair and balanced.
But there’s fair and balanced and then there’s off her rocker crazy train journalism.
That’s Brazile.
Nuts.”
It wasn’t long after she was fired by CNN that Donna Brazile quickly wrote a tell-all which fingered Hillary as the brainchild behind an unethically-appearing fundraising bargain with the Democratic National Committee, in which the DNC was rigged in Clinton’s favor because her campaign was largely financing the party early on in the presidential election. And Donna Brazile, who knew about it from the get-go said the agreement “was not illegal, but it sure looked unethical.”
Of course,
as Bernie has long said,
it’s all about the Benjamins,
and a
Corporate System
legally rigged
AGAINST
the
Average American.
“What CNN did to Bernie Sanders in the Iowa Democratic presidential debate — stabbing him with the gender card on behalf of a weakened Elizabeth Warren — was cheap and unfair.
“And it was shameful.
“I’m probably the last guy to defend Sanders. He is a man of the far left and I most certainly am not.
“But even a conservative like me can see that Sanders was cheated out of the Democratic presidential nomination the last time, with the Democratic National Committee rigging the whole thing for Hillary Clinton. And now it’s happening again.
“No wonder the Sanders supporters are angry.
“What happened on CNN in Iowa was bad for journalism. But it sure was good for Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden.
“Sanders, the authentic candidate on the left in this cycle, as he was in the last, was surging in the Iowa polls. Warren, also on the left, was fading, desperate and in full panic. She began waving her gender card on that dangerous Intersectionality Highway where Democrats, addicted to identity politics, often crack up.
…
“And Joe? With Bernie on Trump jury duty in Washington, Biden is left to wander around Iowa with (former) Mayor Pete — who also was not challenged by CNN — and that radical billionaire environmentalist who made his gold in fossil fuels.
“No wonder Sanders’ supporters are upset. They’ve seen this before. They watched the same game play out three years ago, when the Democratic nomination was almost his, and establishment media handmaidens of the Democratic National Committee protected Hillary Clinton, who lost to Trump.
“A Sanders vs. Trump campaign in 2016 would have been a clash of populist titans. Sanders could have won. We might see this matchup in 2020. Establishment Democrats are panicked, and conventional wisdom suggests Trump would smash him, but I’m not so sure.
“The electorate has been primed by relentless media attacks on Trump, who attacks them back. Americans are unsettled and worried about their future in a world undergoing economic upheaval. Bernie could win.
“The Democratic base is energized for 2020. Sanders, who suffered a heart attack weeks ago, looks positively vital when compared to Biden. Conventional wisdom also once said Republican Jeb Bush couldn’t be beat. How did that turn out?
“Joe is the new Jeb.
“I suppose it would be much easier to focus instead on Trump impeachment theater in Washington. But the script has been written, the Senate won’t convict Trump. It’s all posture and gesture and fundraising.
“I disagree with Sanders’ policies, but at least he’s honest about what he wants to do. Establishment Democrats see Sanders’ base as full of energy and know they must stop him in Iowa and New Hampshire.
“They feed Warren so Sanders doesn’t defeat Biden. And they’ll use friendly media to shape a stiletto and slip it between Bernie’s ribs.
“Sanders’ voters have seen this one before.”
And that is precisely what Bernie has been saying all along.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, September 13, 2019
Warren Acts Like Frontrunner Though Polling 2nd or 3rd
At last night’s Democratic candidate debate at HBCU Texas Southern University in Houston – the 3rd in a field winnowed nearly in half – Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren continued to demonstrate how and why she will be the Democratic Party’s nominee for President.
Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz is also clearly indicating that Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren will likely become the Democratic Party’s Presidential Nominee.
“If Republicans abandon the Second Amendment and demoralize millions of Americans who care deeply about Second Amendment rights, that could go a long way to electing a President Elizabeth Warren.”
– Ted Cruz, at a Christian Science Monitor-sponsored breakfast
“We’re going to see record-shattering Democratic turnout. The only element missing to ensure Democratic victory is demoralizing conservatives so they stay home. I hope we don’t do that.”
– Ted Cruz, in response to Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, May 2, 2019
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.”Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, February 4, 2019
The yearbook photo ruckus with the Virginia Governor is, in my estimation, totally blown out of proportion, andthis Op-Edsuccinctly 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 Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Wednesday, January 23, 2019
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.
Law Enforcement Officers in Shelby County, the county SOUTHEAST of, and immediately adjacent to Jefferson County – where Birmingham, the state’s most populous city, is located – arrested the 38-year-old young shop owner for violating Alabama’s Controlled Substances Act, after sending samples of his wares to a state forensics laboratory for analysis.
Jefferson and Shelby counties, Alabama
Compared to Alabama’s other 66 counties, Shelby County is more well-to-do (Shelby County’s median household income is $72,310, while the state’s median household income is $44,758), “well heeled,” more highly educated (41.4% of the residents aged 25+ have a Bachelor’s degree AT LEAST, while only 24.0% of the state at large does), etc., than almost any other county in the state.
So, one would hope – indeed, expect – better, more well-informed Public Officials.
But then again, the state continues reeling from the aftershocks of the corruption scandals of the convicted former Speaker of the House, Mike Hubbard, and a veritable host of other predominately GOP lawmakers who were similarly indicted, and either plead guilty to, or were convicted by Federal, and/or State authorities for numerous felony offenses, ranging from healthcare fraud, to mail fraud, and other corrupt, illegal and deceptive practices.
Alabama, being what it is – an inflexible, hard-line, bipolar political state which has swung to the far end of the Republican political spectrum for many years – duly elected to a full term the weak, former Marshall County District Attorney Steve Marshall whom was appointed by corrupt Governor Bentley to fill the unexpired term of the Attorney General’s office vacated by Bentley’s appointment of Luther Strange to fill the unexpired term of Jeff Sessions, whom was nominated to be US Attorney General by President Trump.
Just like voters did the same for Kay Ivey, the former Lieutenant Governor (who historically and practically has no influence upon state affairs) who succeeded to the Office of Governor upon Bentley’s resignation, for the final two years of his second, and final, unexpired term.
One would rightfully, and justifiably be concerned about anything and everything done by the corrupt Governor Bentley – especially political appointments – and turned away such all such appointees during the General Election. But apparently, the state’s voters didn’t see things that way.
The level, depth, breadth, and width of insanity, asininity and corruption in the state is quite simply, stupefyingly breathtaking.
Frankly, all this is so unnecessarily confusing. Even Alabama’s Controlled Substances Act has such significant variability and discretion that criminal charges have used to include the weight of butter (it has been) in calculating criminal offenses. It’s the proverbial indictment of the ham sandwich.
This tomfoolery of a law enforcement shell game could be absolutely, totally, and completely resolved fully and completely – 100% – by legalizing, taxing, and regulating cannabis for Medical, and Adult Recreational use. It’s just that simple. We’ve seen it before. We’re seeing it now. But Alabama is ever the “stick in the mud” – or pig sty – take your pick.
So… having briefly come up for air, here we go again, back into the “deep dive.”
The plant genus known as “cannabis” has two predominate subtypes:
1.) cannabis sativa, and;
2.) cannabis indica.
While a third subtype – cannabis ruderalis – exists, it’s more like a dwarfed version which produces practically nothing of any value, so it’s largely ignored.
Women and hemp, date unknown, likely late 1800’s.
Cannabis sativa, and cannabis indica are both called “marijuana.” By the way, the word “marijuana” is actually a derivative of a slang name given to it some years ago by Mexicans. It has more accurately been known for a much longer time by its proper name, cannabis.
Hemp is also cannabis. Hemp is most often cannabis sativa, because the sativa variety grows very tall, spindly stalks. In contrast, cannabis indica is a short, shrubby type plant.
Spreading hemp to dry in Kentucky, 1898.
Historically, hemp has been grown and used for its fiber content for eons throughout the world, and in America. And notably, during WWII, it was grown for rope production as part of the war effort by the tens of thousands of acres in Illinois and Kentucky. During that time, in 1942, following an embargo on the supplies of manila and abaca fiber used in rope-making supplied from the Philippines, the United States Department of Agriculture, produced a film called Hemp for Victory, which encouraged farmers – especially those in Kentucky – to grow hemp to help the war effort. It was seen as patriotic thing to do.
On the other hand, “marijuana” is defined as cannabis sativa (and cannabis indica) which has a greater THC content than 0.3% by weight.
Marijuana is consumed for euphoric effects induced by THC.
Marijuana has CBD -and- THC.
Hemp has MOSTLY CBD.
Cannabis that has greater THC content than CBD content is typically “marijuana,” because the two strains are not consistent, and each strain (hemp or marijuana) produce one, or the other (CBD or THC) in greater abundance comparatively.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, November 13, 2018
Arizona Representative Kyrsten Sinema D-CD9, has won the Senate race against opponent AZ Representative Martha McSally, R-CD2.
Arizona Representative Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat who represented Congressional District 9, has won election over Representative Martha McSally, a Republican who represented the state’s Congressional District 2.
Her election is historical for at least two different reasons, the first being that she is the state’s first female US Senator, and second, she will be the first openly bisexual Member of Congress. She is also the first Democrat Arizonans have sent to the Senate since 1995 after Democrat Dennis DeConcini’s loss to Republican John Kyl.
Following the death of Republican Senator John McCain, who since 1987 was the state’s longest-serving senator, Republican Arizona Governor Doug Ducey temporarily appointed Kyl in September 2018 to fill the remainder of the term of that vacated seat. In a press conference following Governor Ducey’s announcement, Mr. Kyl said he would not seek re-election for the remainder of the term in the 2020 Special Election to fill the seat.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Wednesday, April 18, 2018
79.
That’s the current number of Congressional resignations from the House, and Senate which will be replaced soon.
The House has 73 resignations, while the Senate has 6, of which 60 are Republicans, and 19 Democrats.
Alabama’s Special Election in which Democrat Doug Jones won was a bellwether (he’s the first Democrat to represent Alabama in the Senate since Howell Heflin retired in 1997, and the first Democrat elected statewide since 2008), and Democrat Conor Lamb’s win in Pennsylvania’s highly gerrymandered 18th Congressional District was confirmation. Lamb, whose district voted for Trump by nearly 20 points and wasn’t supposed to win (The Cook Political Report rated the district R+11), was sworn in April 12. Pennsylvania’s State Supreme Court also ruled that such gerrymandering was unconstitutional.
Here’s another Special Election to watch.
April 24 is the date of Arizona’s Special Election to replace Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ, 8) who resigned amidst claims that he asked at least two female staffers to be surrogate mothers for him and his wife.
The Democratic candidate is Hiral Tipirneni, a former Emergency Room Physician who now works as a cancer research advocate.
Her Republican challenger is Republican AZ state Sen. Debbie Lesko.
Arizona Central newspaper reported from the candidates’ Campaign Finance disclosures, that Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, December 17, 2017
According to a news item published by the Associated Press, Friday, December 15, 2017 and subsequently reported by Business Insider on December 16, 2017, 12:43 PM ET, “Alabama Republican Roy Moore on Friday told supporters that the “battle is not over” in Alabama’s Senate race even though President Donald Trump and others have called on him to concede. Moore sent a fundraising email to supporters asking for contributions to his “election integrity fund’ so he could investigate reports of voter fraud. “I also wanted to let you know that this battle is NOT OVER!” he wrote.”
-and-
“Roy Moore still refuses to concede — and he asked supporters to donate to an ‘election integrity fund’ to find voter fraud.”
The outcome of an election does NOT depend upon whether a candidate concedes, or not.
Thus, Roy Moore can “refuse” to concede to his perverted little heart’s delight… and it STILL WILL NOT HAVE ANY BEARING ON THE ELECTION’S OUTCOME.
So now, the great game is to sit back and watch what that damn-fool idiot does. And, if the story (including Moore’s previous actions) is any guide, he will likely rely upon what he describes as “numerous reported cases of voter fraud” which he and his campaign will send to Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, December 12, 2017
“Roy Moore is no prize, but Alabama doesn’t need an opportunistic weasel like Doug Jones representing it. For one thing, he’ll drive a wedge within Alabama’s congressional delegation. He will quickly show he doesn’t share the values of most Alabamians because he will be a puppet of ilk like Schumer and Pelosi. The Senate will likely not seat Moore and Alabama’s governor can appoint a better qualified individual to the seat. This is much more desirable than “Sen. Jones.””
—//—
My thoughts in response to the preceding post:
Obviously, we do not know each other, however, I would appreciate the opportunity to rebut some of your commentary.
You wrote in part that renown former Federal Prosecutor, now Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate from Alabama Doug Jones for Senate is, “an opportunistic weasel,” and yet you provided no evidence to support your assertion. Strike one. (Supposing that by “weasel” you meant to refer to someone whose story constantly changes, you surely mean to refer to Roy Moore, whose story has so changed after facing increased scrutiny.)
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, October 23, 2017
In a recent exchange online dialogue with friends – some, whom to the casual observer would be diametrically opposed on many policy ideas – I was, once again, pleased to note that, despite the SEEMING APPEARANCE of differences, we share SIGNIFICANT common ground.
In fact, I have found that to be quite true with many, that when we move past the vitriolic venomous sport of castigating political candidates, and speak in respectful tones, patiently explaining the whys and wherefores of potential policy, we share many common bonds, and similar ideas.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Wednesday, September 20, 2017
Portland, Oregon and Birmingham, Alabama couldn’t be further apart in many ways – geographically, and politically, particularly. However, recent research show that one attitude in particular is very similar.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, September 17, 2017
Naysayers to the “public option,” or “single payer” health insurance plan claim that it’s “socialized medicine.” You know… much like what Military Service Members – and their families – in the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines have access to. And to be certain, the health insurance “money grab” came through Richard Nixon‘s signature on a bill written by Massachusetts’ U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy… the Health Maintenance Organization Act of 1973.
Before that law was passed, it was ILLEGAL to profit from delivery of healthcare services. Now, we have avariciously rapacious Wall-Street masters slave driving the people for more and more and more and more profit. The greedy, never-ending quest for profits has quickly deteriorated the American healthcare delivery system, which was once a marvel of the world. Now, according to the World Health Organization 2000 report of its 191 member nations health systems, the United States ranked 37th in efficiency worldwide, while France, Italy, San Marino, Andorra, and Malta round out the top five most efficient nations for delivery of healthcare services. Japan ranks 10th, while the United Kingdom is 18th, and Canada is 30th. The United States is sandwiched in between Costa Rica, and Slovenia, respectively.
Truth be told – and it’s sad to say – there are probably as many corrupt Democrats as there are corrupt Republicans, neither of whom have the people’s best interests at heart, or in mind. Such ones’ solitary concern is with their own wallet, and how they can profit privately at taxpayer expense. That includes graft through directing contracts and business toward friends’ business interests.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, June 18, 2017
Debbie Wasserman Schultz should get out of politics. She has ruined any semblance of good will with voters of any political stripe, particularly and especially among Democrats. Her blatant covert violation of party policy and rules which was exposed by WikiLeaks still smarts among Democrats. It was corruption on the same level as that of Trump. Pure & Simple. Both parties are sadly corrupt, and virtually no one has the people’s back.
Toxic Debbie Wasserman Schultz to Appear at Leadership Blue Gala
By Leslie Wimes
June 13, 2017 – 10:00am
Clearly the new regime at the Florida Democratic Party learned nothing from the chorus of boos that Debbie Wasserman Schultz received at the DNC convention.
The resounding chants of “shame” spewed at the disgraced former DNC chairwoman, forced to resign in infamy, hasn’t convinced the failing party that putting the most divisive figure in recent Florida Democratic political history on stage at its biggest fundraising event will be a big mistake.
Whose idea is this? Wasserman Schultz’s?
Is she still pulling the strings in the party? If the new chair, Stephen Bittel, thinks this is a great idea, then perhaps his judgment has to be seriously questioned.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, May 12, 2017
You’ve likely seen a meme floating around referencing how America’s Most Poverty Stricken counties voted Republican.
Yes?
I decided to research the matter to see:
1.) If it was true, and;
2.) Exactly what else I’d find.
While my analysis isn’t fully complete, there are already some early fascinating findings.
Breaking down Poverty into two categories – Per Capita Income (PCI) and Median Household Income (MHI) – has shown “the usual suspects,” but exposed some not-so-usual ones, as well.
For example, we often hear that West Virginia is a very High Poverty state, along with Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Data from the United States Census Bureau (USCB) backs up those claims… yet only to a limited extent.
But, “pockets” of poverty may exist in an otherwise not-so-poor state (and they do), and a state may have a high number of Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Wednesday, March 29, 2017
Today, March 29, is now officially “National Vietnam War Veterans Day.”
And as with so many things, it took an act of Congress to make it so.
But it was a bipartisan effort, for which – I suppose – we can be thankful. Especially given since the do-nothing GOP is now in control of Congress.
On February 3, Sen. Patrick Toomey (R-PA), sponsored S.305, and along with co-sponsor Sen. Joe Donnelly (D-IN), introduced the bill in the Senate, which was read twice, considered, read the third time, passed without amendment by Unanimous Consent, discharged by the Committee on the Judiciary, Passed/agreed to in the House by voice vote, and was signed into law by President Trump March 23, 2017. It is the 14th law Trump has signed since his inauguration.
From the date of introduction to passage, it could very well be one of the most rapidly-enacted pieces of legislation in Congressional history. Of course, THE shortest was likely 1 day, for H.J.Res.131: “Making further continuing appropriations for fiscal year 2015, and for other purposes,” which was a government shutdown stopgap measure. Mysteriously, Congress gets rapidly active when their paychecks are imperiled.
As far as laws go, it’s a good law, because the Congressional Budget Office has declared it would cost nothing. When was the last time you ever read that?
And it’s a short law – another rarity in this day and age. In fact, there are only Read more… if you dare!
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, March 12, 2017
True, or False?
If under oath, you say, “and I did not have _X_” and in fact, you did have _X_, are you a perjurer?
The statement “and I did not have _X_” is a voluntary assertion, and claim of fact by the speaker. It makes an independent statement. It does not answer a question.
By virtue of the use of the word “and,” the claimant is making a voluntary assertion which can stand alone, and which needs no other support. Rather, by using the word “and,” the statement which follows that word supports any statement predicated within it, and would appear to lend credence to any statement which preceded it, simply because it is “added onto” a primary claim.
And even though it is mentioned in a secondary manner – that is, the remark is mentioned after another statement – it becomes a primary, rather than secondary, assertion. It “flips the table,” in a manner of speaking.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, January 31, 2017
Recently, President Trump was criticized – and sued in Federal Court – over one of his first Executive Orders in the first days of his office.
More specifically, it was his Executive Order No. 13767, signed January 25, 2017, and published January 30, 2017, entitled as “BORDER SECURITY AND IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT IMPROVEMENTS” which has caused a justifiable stir.
–––
–––
Some are all up in arms, again, justifiably so, not merely because of the mass confusion which it has created. In essence, what many have complained about is that many Permanent Resident Aliens (so-called “Green Card” holders) would have been denied re-entry into our United States for a period of 90 days if they were a citizen of, or have visited one of 7 so-called “nations of concern”: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.
It should be remembered, however, that the so-called 7 “nations of concern” first began during the Obama administration.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, December 5, 2016
A man named John Goodwin made a public post on FaceBook, which also included a link to an OpEd published in the Washington Post on November 9, 2016, which was written by Charles Camosy (PhD, University of Notre Dame), and entitled “Trump won because college-educated Americans are out of touch.” Dr. Camosy is an Associate Professor of Theological and Social Ethics at Fordham University, and the author of a book entitled “Beyond the Abortion Wars: A Way Forward for A New Generation.”
Mr. Goodwin’s FaceBook profile is sufficiently ambiguous of himself, though in his public post which is time & date-stamped 9:45AM, November 10, 2016, and ostensibly geolocated from Washington, D.C., he wrote of himself that, “I haven’t posted about the election mostly because 1) I do this for a living and most of you don’t,” which would lead one to suppose that at some level, he works in or with public policy, or more likely, with politicians.
I do not.
However, suffice it to say, that for many, many, many years, I have remained immensely interested in public policy, though I do not now, nor have I ever made my living from it, or influencing, or attempting to influence others in elected office.
In order to fully understand the matter of discussion herein, I encourage the reader to fully read this item following herein, as well as Mr. Goodwin’s post, and the OpEd upon which he opined
I have responded to Mr. Goodwin’s post as follows:
His words appear italicized, and in “quotation marks.”
My commentary follows immediately after.
“…not everyone lives in big cities.” • That is correct. The United States Census Bureau says that 80.7% of American reside in urban areas. In fact, they report that “the population density in cities is more than 46 times higher than the territory outside of cities.” So that leaves a whopping 19.3% in rural areas.
“I didn’t grow up with money.” • Money had been invented by the time I was born. But seriously, someone votes for Donald Trump as if the wealthy are advocates for the impoverished or even the average American? C’mon. Mr. Born-With-A-Silver-Spoon-In-His-Mouth? Really?
“…not everyone went to elite colleges.” • According to the United States Census Bureau, “in 2015, almost 9 out of 10 adults (88 percent) had at least a high school diploma or GED, while nearly 1 in 3 adults (33 percent) held a bachelor’s or higher degree.” I’m in the 33%. So I’m an elite. Thanks!
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, November 13, 2016
Sunday, November 13, 2016
Day 5: The standard has been set… by a Black man.
According to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) – the huge government bureaucracy established by Executive Order 13228 under President George W. Bush on October 8, 2001 – and it’s subsidiary bureaucracy the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE), from 2009-2015, President Barack Obama has deported over 2.5 Million illegal immigrants… more than the George W. Bush administration.
Statistics for this year (2016) are not ready, because… the year hasn’t ended. Duh!
So, there are more to be added to the “we kicked you out because you broke the law” rolls.
Really? Obama deported more illegals than Bush?
Yup.
He’s deported so many illegals that he’s been nicknamed the “Deporter in Chief.”
In fact, he’s deported MORE than any other administration in history.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, November 13, 2016
November 12, 2016
Day 4: The shit’s starting to hit the fam… er, fan
Donald Trump, the GOP Presidential nominee who appears to have won the 2016 General Election, has reportedly made remarks that he might not, after all, as he proclaimed in his “Contract with the American Voter” that he would “5.) Repeal and Replace Obamacare Act. Fully repeals Obamacare and replaces it with Health Savings Accounts, the ability to purchase health insurance across state lines…”
Strike One:
According to his first post-election interview, which was exclusive to the Wall Street Journal, “President-elect Donald Trump said he would consider leaving in place certain parts of the Affordable Care Act,” and that “Mr. Trump said he favors keeping the prohibition against insurers denying coverage because of patients’ existing conditions, and a provision that allows parents to provide years of additional coverage for children [up to age 26] on their insurance policies.”
President-elect Donald Trump leaves a meeting with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), at the U.S. Capitol November 10, 2016 in Washington, DC Zach Gibson/Getty Images
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Saturday, November 12, 2016
November 11, 2016
Day 3: Still thinking
Yesterday, President Obama met with Donald Trump at the White House. It was the first time either of them had met. According to brief remarks made to the Press afterward, their collegial meeting lasted about one and a half hours.
The erudite will recall that “the first 100 days” is taken from a radio address given by Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s first term in office, in which during his first 100 days , and modeled after his plan to get Americans back to work, protect their savings and create prosperity, provide relief for the sick and elderly, and get industry and agriculture back on their feet.
Having read Trump’s goals for his first 100 days in office, it seems to me that there are some ideas I can support. Yet, there’s some pure bluster and ignorance designed for purely emotional appeal. I’ll separate fact from fiction, and we’ll have to wait and see how it all pans out.
See: donald-trumps-contract-w-american-voter
Trump’s objectives are in bold, my comments follow.
—/—
First: Constitutional Amendment for Congressional Term Limits – I have long supported that idea. Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell (R), however, opposes them – as, presumably, do some others. Whenever their income source or security is potentially challenged, they’ll fight. Which is probably all the more reason it ought to enacted. A Lifetime Limit of Eight terms in the House of Representatives (2 years x 8 terms=16 years), and a Lifetime Limit of Two terms in the Senate (2 terms x 6 years=12 years) for a combined total of 20 years Lifetime Total ought to be enough for anyone.
Second: Federal Hiring Freeze, to reduce federal workforce through attrition (exempting military, public safety, and public health) – I can understand that, and could go along with that for a period of time. Realize also that whenever any public action is required to be taken – such as “extreme vetting,” it is done by Federal Employees. So if their numbers are reduced, as a natural result, expect slow-downs and delays in any actions undertaken.
Third: Require that for every new federal regulation, two existing regulations must be eliminated – That’s unrealistic, and impracticable. It may be nice to think about, but as a blanket statement, it’s simply unrealistic.
Fourth: A 5 year-ban on White House and Congressional officials becoming lobbyists after they leave government service – TOTALLY in favor of this idea.
Sixth: Lifetime ban on White House officials lobbying on behalf of a foreign government – Totally in favor of, and the ban should extend to ALL former Federal Employees.
On the same day, I will begin taking the following 7 actions to protect American workers:
FIRST, I will announce my intention to renegotiate NAFTA or withdraw from the deal under Article 2205– I have long advocated for changes to NAFTA, and other Free Trade deals to which the United States is a party.
SECOND, I will announce our withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership – TOTALLY in favor of this idea.
THIRD, I will direct my Secretary of the Treasury to label China a currency manipulator – Some say “yes,” some say “no,” but there is no disagreement China has bought American currency on the FOREX (Foreign Currency Exchange Market), and has purchased American indebtedness (T-bills, and other bonds). Mr. C. Fred Bergsten, Senior Fellow and Director Emeritus at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, put it this way: “Currency manipulation occurs when Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, October 27, 2016
Church Pastor: The Truth About My Late-Term Abortion
by Amy Butler, October 26, 2016, 7:55PM EDT
“Trump’s words drove me to tears, and to write my painful story for the first time.”
Elections are supposed to be about real people — and not the ones whose names appear on the ballot. They are supposed to be about all of us, the policies that will impact our lives in tangible ways and the choices we make about the country we want to be.
The Rev. Dr. Amy Butler is the Senior Minister of The Riverside Church in New York City. Prior to this call, Pastor Amy served as Senior Pastor of Calvary Baptist Church in Washington, D.C. Pastor Amy holds degrees from Baylor University (BA ‘91, MA ‘96); The International Baptist Theological Seminary (BDiv ‘95); and Wesley Theological Seminary (DMin ‘09).
But this year, we have watched a major candidate for our country’s highest office demean and slander whole categories of American citizens. We have watched him make offensive, outrageous claims about real people and real decisions that everyday Americans face. People like me. Decisions like mine.
What sent me to my computer to write is late-term abortion. As I heard Donald Trump talk about babies being “ripped” from their mothers’ wombs, as if ending a pregnancy is a reckless, irresponsible afterthought, my outrage poured down my face in angry tears. In those moments, Trump, who has never been pregnant and presumably has navigated this far in his life without undertaking any difficult, gut-wrenching, gray-area decisions, used my own pain — deep, deep pain — to advance his political agenda.
But his words won’t tell my story, so I’ll tell it here. I don’t often speak about this experience. And I’ve never written about it until now.
The late-term abortion I chose was the end of a dream. The pain was so real and so consuming that navigating my way through the grief, I never thought that I would have the happy, healthy family that I do today. It was one of the most agonizing experiences of my life and Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, October 25, 2016
Some rightfully believe/feel/think that government should NOT be making decisions for them and ask, “Do we really want government making decisions about our health care?” They are steadfastly convinced that they should make such important decisions for themselves.
I agree.
People should be free to make their own decisions in such matters. I don’t want the government, or someone else making decisions for me when I’m fully capable of making them for myself. That’s one HUGE reason why I support Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, October 20, 2016
A few thoughts on a Presidential Debate topic by Moderator Chris Wallace of Fox News, with candidates Hillary Clinton (D) and Donald Trump (R) from the third, and final debate held last night at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Wednesday, 19 October 2016:
2.) A portion of her blog entry (linked herein) on the topic from the Debate states: “Trump’s statement, as incorrect as it may be, supports the fallacy of the due-date abortion. It is a common anti-choice narrative that Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, October 3, 2016
Someone opined that they hoped the 2016 GOP Presidential nominee would be elected.
I couldn’t disagree more.
Here’s why:
As we have suffered, never before has there been a more grotesque figure campaigning for the noble office of the President.
The candidate has never served in an office of Public Trust, nor ever served in any Elected Office. There is literally no shred of evidence of governing competency, much less experience, in any Public Office, and though our Constitution states that the minimum eligibility requirements for the office are to be “a citizen of the United States… the age of thirty-five years, and been fourteen years a resident within the United States,” we have never elected an individual as President whom has never served in any capacity of Public Trust, nor Elected Office.
And so, in that regard, the candidate is a significantly Unknown Quantity. That can be, and often is, fraught with enormous peril.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Wednesday, September 14, 2016
There are NO GOOD choices in this General Election.
We have: The Devil We Know vs The Devil We Don’t Know.
We also have: Choosing the lesser of two evils is still a choice FOR evil.
Granted, someone WILL be elected, and granted further, s/he won’t be liked by those whom didn’t vote for the winner.
The two major party’s candidates are almost universally disliked within and without the parties. And that is a very sad state of affairs. It is, in large part, why there was such enormous support for Bernie Sanders… who is the opposite side of the same coin as Trump.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, August 28, 2016
Update: Saturday, 20 February 2021 NOTE: TO THE READER: As you read any story mentioning, involving or written by Donald V. Watkins, Sr., it must be borne in mind that he is now a Federal Convict, and along with his son, Donald V. Watkins, Jr., was found guilty of numerous charges. “Donald Watkins Sr. was convicted of seven counts of wire fraud, two counts of bank fraud and one count of conspiracy. Donald Watkins Jr. was convicted of one count of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy.” As of the date of this note, he is in Federal Custody at Oklahoma City Federal Transfer Center, an administrative security facility, having been relocated away from the minimum security Federal Prison Camp on Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama.
Here also is the SUPERSEDING INDICTMENT dated December 2018 entitled as:
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ALABAMA SOUTHERN DIVISION, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA v. DONALD V. WATKINS, SR. and DONALD V. WATKINS, JR. – 2:18-cr-166-KOB-TMP https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1116081/download
Formerly titled “Why @HillaryClinton’s @StateDept Quid Pro Quo Pay-To-Play Is A Corrupt Practice”
Accountability is what remains once responsibility has fled. The citizens of the United States must demand higher standards from their public servants, and officials, and severely punish violations of the same.
—/—
Bill and Hillary Clinton, Meet Jozette Berry, Alisha Cole and Lashonda Smaw
Former Jefferson County, Alabama revenue clerks Lashonda Smaw, Alisha Cole, and Gazette Berry (pictured from left to right). They engaged in the same unethical conduct that is involved in the Hillary Clinton “cash for prioritized access” scandal. Each woman was investigated, criminally charged with felony ethics violations, and convicted in court. Their total take in gratuities was $120. The total gratuities involved in the Clinton scandal is $156 million, and nobody is under a criminal investigation.
In 2013, Jozette Berry, Alisha Cole and Lashonda Smaw were Jefferson County, Alabama revenue clerks who worked in the downtown County Courthouse and the Center Point Satellite Courthouse. These low-level public servants accepted cash gratuities for cutting people to the front of the 4-hour long, slow moving, car tag line. Cole was caught accepting $20 on two occasions in August 2013. Berry and Smaw were caught accepting $40 on a single occasion in April 2013.
After a local Fox TV news team publicly exposed this criminal conduct, there was immediate and widespread condemnation of the women’s actions. It made national news. This was declared an ethics violation on the part of each woman.
In December 2013, a Jefferson County grand jury indicted Berry, Cole, and Smaw for using their public office for personal gain, which is a felony in Alabama and an ethics violation as well. Each woman faced 2 to 20 years in prison, if convicted.
These women did not have friends in high places. They were not connected to the Obama White House, or the U.S. Attorney General, or the Director of the FBI. They did not hold any political office. They did not have New York spin-doctors or high-powered lawyers to argue that they had done nothing wrong. In short, they had no one who could “fix” their criminal case, or make it go away.
Jozette Berry and Lashonda Smaw, who are black, eventually pled guilty. Alisha Cole, who faced two felony counts of ethics violations, went to trial and was convicted. Berry received a sentence of 12 months of hard labor in the county jail. Imposition of Berry’s sentence was later suspended and she was placed on 2 years of unsupervised probation. After her conviction, Cole received a three-year suspended sentence and two years of unsupervised probation. Smaw’s sentence for her ethics violation is unknown at this time.
The guilty pleas for Berry and Smaw and guilty verdict for Cole ended a multi-year joint criminal investigation by the Jefferson County District Attorney’s Public Corruption and White Collar Crimes Unit, the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office, the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, and the Birmingham Police Department. After the criminal cases ended in May 2015, the local DA proudly released the following statement: “We are grateful to have partners in law enforcement who are Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Thursday, January 14, 2016
Soon, the Alabama state legislature will reconvene, and soon enough, they will – once again – be faced with enormous fiscal shortfalls.
And, once again as well, the Republican super-dominated Alabama state legislature will be reticent, reluctant, and recalcitrant to raise taxes… except upon those least capable of paying them. I refer, of course, to the impoverished, which – according to the United States Census Bureau – comprise nearly 20% of Alabama’s population. And with a population estimated at 4,849,377, that’s 901, 984 people, who annually, according to the research, Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, November 10, 2015
Having made no bones about it, I remain searingly and scathingly critical of Alabama Governor Robert Julian Bentley, a retired physician-turned-Republican legislator from Tuscaloosa, who is twice elected governor – in 2010, and in 2014.
While I wished him well after his initial victory in the governor’s race against his Democratic opponent then-Secretary of Agriculture and Industries, Ron Sparks, he has disappointed the state since Inauguration Day 2011 when he put his foot in his mouth at Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church, Montgomery, where on Martin Luther King Day, Monday, January 17, 2011 – mere hours after taking the oath of office and inauguration – he said in part, “There may be some people here today who do not have living within them the Holy Spirit. But if you have been adopted in God’s family like I have, and like you have if you’re a Christian and if you’re saved, and the Holy Spirit lives within you just like the Holy Spirit lives within me, then you know what that makes? It makes you and me brothers. And it makes you and me brother and sister. Now I will have to say that, if we don’t have the same daddy, we’re not brothers and sisters. So anybody here today who has not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, I’m telling you, you’re not my brother and you’re not my sister, and I want to be your brother.”
It was at that point that Rebekah Caldwell Mason became his Communication Director, and later, Senior Political Advisor-cum-paramour.
More to the point, however, I have maintained that among other things, as an elected official, he has been feckless, and clueless.
But, let’s let him speak for himself.
Here’s in part what Governor Bentley said in a speech to a statewide gathering of city officials in Montgomery, May 2013, “You know where I came up with that idea? Ron Sparks.Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, October 2, 2015
Update: Saturday, 20 February 2021 NOTE: TO THE READER: As you read any story mentioning, involving or written by Donald V. Watkins, Sr., it must be borne in mind that he is now a Federal Convict, and along with his son, Donald V. Watkins, Jr., was found guilty of numerous charges. “Donald Watkins Sr. was convicted of seven counts of wire fraud, two counts of bank fraud and one count of conspiracy. Donald Watkins Jr. was convicted of one count of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy.” As of the date of this note, he is in Federal Custody at Oklahoma City Federal Transfer Center, an administrative security facility, having been relocated away from the minimum security Federal Prison Camp on Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama.
Here also is the SUPERSEDING INDICTMENT dated December 2018 entitled as:
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ALABAMA SOUTHERN DIVISION, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA v. DONALD V. WATKINS, SR. and DONALD V. WATKINS, JR. – 2:18-cr-166-KOB-TMP https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1116081/download
Hammett exited the scene at the governor’s office because he was not comfortable with the growing scandal that has ensnared the governor and senior political advisor, Rebekah Caldwell Mason.
Hammett was one the staffers Bentley dispatched to get troopers on the security detail to sign confidentiality statements as Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, July 12, 2015
racist: rāsəst: A person who shows or feels discrimination or prejudice against people of other races, or who believes that a particular race is superior to another.
bigot: A person who is intolerant towards those holding different opinions.
As a noun, racism is “a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human racial groups determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one’s own race is superior and has the right to dominate others or that a particular racial group is inferior to the others.”
Yesterday – Saturday July 11, 2015 – the State Democratic Executive Committee of the Alabama Democratic Party met in Montgomery. The ostensible purpose of that meeting was to elect members to fill vacancies in the party.
The reason why is quite simple, and can be summed up in one word: Mismanagement.
Chairwoman Nancy Worley, former Secretary of State, and former teacher from New Hope, in Madison county (in the northernmost part of the state, bordering Tennessee), has Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Saturday, June 13, 2015
Alabama State Senator Larry Stutts has once again been named in another malpractice lawsuit in which a patient of his retained placental tissue, and suffered excessive bleeding following delivery of her baby.
The new case is oddly reminiscent of an older case in which Stutts was named defendant, in which his patient retained placental tissue and suffered excessive bleeding, and later died. The new case’s Plaintiff, Greta C. Cooper, did not die.
The suit alleges, among other things, that Stutts failed to order powerful antibiotics to be administered EXCLUSIVELY by Licensed Professional Nurses, and that two RNs with Gentiva Home Health Services in Russellville, Alabama, then taught the Plaintiff’s husband how to administer the medication, and that as a result of his failure to properly order, blood levels of the medication were also not taken which resulted in overdose toxicity.
Dr. Larry Stutts, DVM, MD (R), who was first a veterinarian, then became an Obstetrician/Gynecologist (OBGYN), upset 32-year veteran Alabama Senate District 6 State Senator Roger Bedford (D) by 67 votes in the 2014 November General Election. Stutts is also president of Colbert Obstetrics and Gynecology, PC (his private medical practice), located at 1120 S Jackson Hwy #104, Sheffield, AL 35660, (256) 386-0855.
Alabama District 6 State Senator Dr. Larry Stutts, DVM, MD
Alabama State Senate District 6 encompasses all of Franklin County, and portions of Colbert, Marion, Lauderdale and Lawrence Counties in NW Alabama.
Stutts is the same physician who was years earlier named in another lawsuit in which his patient Rose Church – a newlywed, and healthy 36-year-old Registered Nurse – died, which in turn, Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, May 24, 2015
Someone asked: “Getting Alabama’s voters to overhaul the state constitution seems like a pipedream. Do we accept things as they are, and go about our business? I’m ready to overthrow ALL of Montgomery, purge the place, and start over.”
I responded as follows:
There’s certainly no question we’ve a fine kettle of fish to fry. These clowns have NO agenda, and are just flying by the seat of their pants, inventing some asinine idea at the drop of a hat, one day to the next.
Sadly, the people, for the greatest part, are blithely unaware of the shenanigans and goings-on amongst the Goat Hill Gangsters. The “media” – by which I mean Read the rest of this entry »
The Volunteer State and the nation are grieving over the deaths of three 9-year old children, and 3 adults gunned down at The Covenant School, a private Christian elementary school in Nashville’s Green Hills district. The world has taken notice not only the victims’ deaths, but of the heroic actions of Nashville’s Metro Police Department, whose members were on scene and resolved the problem in 15 minutes. Such quick action undoubtedly saved lives. They are to be commended beyond measure, and deservedly should be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, our nation’s highest civilian honor, perhaps even the Congressional Gold Medal.
Warm Southern Breeze 