Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 1933-2020; RIP

The death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, or RBG as she was known to her fans, may well precipitate the nastiest judicial battle in living memory. 

It shouldn't, if anyone in government had the common decency to honor her final wish that her seat not be filled by a Trump nominee.

Republicans and Conservatives of all stripes can barely hide their glee at her passing. Those are some sick people. The always-disgusting Asshole-in-Chief, rather than posting anything even resembling a eulogy, put out an absurd tweet about Republican power and prestige, saying that the vacancy must be filled "without delay." 

Right. Tell that to Merrick Garland, President Barack Obama's proposed replacement for Antonin Scalia, whom Archdemon Mitch McConnell totally ignored for 293 days, and, flaming racist that he is, shamefully disrespected Obama in the process.

The Senate Democrats, in honor of the memory of RBG, and to provide some comeuppance to McConnell on Obama's behalf, must block any and all moves the unpresident makes to fill the vacancy. 

The election is forty-five days away--a reasonable time for officially mourning a person of RBG's stature. Trump and the Republicans can damn well wait that long. They blocked Garland for the better part of a year. The Idiot Child-in-Chief will then lapse into lame duck status, and no one will pay attention to him and his ridiculous tweets.

I urge you all, if you haven't already, to contact your senators and Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Senate Democratic Leader, to express your support for blocking any attempt by Trump to fill RBG's seat. That honor is rightfully the next president's.

It's the Democrats' time to hoist the battle standard of justice and democracy.

 

--- Diogenes, 9/19/2020

 

Is This The End, My Friends?

I've not been writing because I've spent the past couple of days keeping my ear to the ground listening for end-days chatter, and it's not easy to use a keyboard in that position.

But seriously, I'm just waiting for the Armageddon folks to start making noise; they might as well--crazies of every other type are out there.

The Western states continue to burn--the smoke has reached us here in the upper Southeast, making the sky hazy, and there's a slew of hurricanes and storms taking aim at us. Greenland, the Arctic and Antarctica are melting away, and COVID-19 is raging in the Plains and popping up again around Europe. And, oh, yeah, the government and Congress are full of demons and imps.

Can you say apocalyptic?

So what say you? Should we be looking for signs in the heavens?

I don't think so. DJTrump is far too incompetent at everything to be the Antichrist. If I had to name a good candidate for that office it would be Archdemon Mitch "Moscow" McConnell. But getting right down to it, my personal opinion is that the concurrence of natural disasters, the man-made variety, and the impending collapse of the U. S. government is coincidence.

I'll be listening for sounds of The End a while longer, but will be back with the usual fare shortly.

--- Diogenes, 9/18/2020

Who Should We Fear? Part 2

I put the question: Should we fear those who follow Trump?

Yes and no, I think. We should fear every person who intends to cast a vote for the unpresident and strive to change their minds if possible. Every vote that goes to Trump is one that doesn't go to Biden, and we need to work hard to keep those votes to a minimum.

Apart from their ability to cast dangerous votes, is this entire group fearsome? No. It contains friends and family members, whose choices I respect even though I haven't a clue why they've gone to the dark side. They're intelligent, usually reasonable people, but they've become misguided

Fear is one of Trump's primary weapons. He tries to conjure it out of the air with rumors of war and disease, with pronouncements on the impossibility of casting a secure vote, with predictions that our neighborhoods will soon be overrun with "undesirables" i.e. people who are not like us.

If we begin to believe the baseless and ridiculous threats Trump broadcasts, we will have lost. His strength is in the credulity of his followers. Somehow he finds a way to make the impossible and implausible seem real to them.

To give an example, a colleague was recently informed by a college student that COVID-19 is a hoax. He said this in all seriousness. Imagine a hoax that would involve the public health agencies of virtually every country in the world, millions of healthcare workers, the heads of state of all the major nations, NGOs, international aid agencies, and some 930,000 people worldwide willing to die for the cause. I think I might be frightened that someone could actually believe such a thing.

Some of Trump's followers are loud and boisterous and very visible in the news when there is a rally or a trouble spot somewhere. The crowd wearing the red MAGA shirt has become a "big they." Because they were in Portland doesn't mean they will be in Louisville; the fact that they were in Kenosha doesn't mean they'll be in Topeka. They are mot ubiquitous. Still, a friend of mine said recently that she wouldn't put a Biden sign out because "they" would vandalize it. Fear won that day.

Trump is a terrorist. He rules by spreading fear, rumors and uncertainty. His followers mindlessly spread it further, retweeting or sharing his words and ideas without thinking about them. 

It is the disease of false rumors and lies we must fear, not those who spread them. We must work to keep the truth alive, the lies tamped down, and the rumormongers muzzled.

FDR said it: "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

 

--- Diogenes, 9/15/2020