ARIZONA...The Hotbed Of Anti-Democracy

 

I have lived in Arizona for over twenty years. We left Los Angeles because of the gangs that were slowly migrating up the coast where we lived. When we arrived here and discovered how conservative and far-right the state was (didn't do my homework), we didn't want to leave; rather we thought another liberal presence in the land of the sun could help change the state to, at least, moderate. We have had luck finding other liberals and now Arizona has definitely turned purple, we think on the way to blue.

But as it turns out the Donald Trump administration, which didn't make the state necessarily more red, did incite the brand of retaliatory politics that has resulted in the recent chaotic gubernatorial election. Kari Lake, a radical right Trumpster who is also a 2020 election denier, challenged Democrat, Katie Hobbs, who wasn't squeaky clean but a hell of a lot more honest and qualified than Lake. Hobbs had a narrow win but Lake is still contesting the certified voting results. 

Other Trumpsters and 2020 election deniers also lost, but Abe Hamadeh, in a tight race for...

"attorney general, filed a lawsuit on Tuesday contesting the preliminary results of an election that had already been headed to an automatic recount."

You can see the stupidity of these people who react with no thought to what they are doing. Idiots. Hamadeh had a guaranteed runoff. But, what puzzles me even more, probably shouldn't in Arizona, is the fact the races are so close. You would think when known anarchists are on the ballot the logic would be that it is a threat to our democracy, vote them down. Much of the country did in the blue tsunami, but not Arizona. The New York Times reports...

Mr. Hamadeh’s lawsuit, filed in State Superior Court in Maricopa County, names as defendants Arizona’s secretary of state — Katie Hobbs, a Democrat who won the governor’s race — as well as the county recorders and boards of supervisors in the state’s 15 counties. The Republican National Committee joined Mr. Hamadeh in the suit as a plaintiff.

 Inside The Arizona GOP' 'Anti-Democracy Experiment'...

And on Thanksgiving Day, it was reported that Lake filed a lawsuit against Maricopa County, demanding information about Election Day printer problems. She said, "I still have hope." Here's the scenario...

"Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake filed a lawsuit against Maricopa County officials on Wednesday, accusing them of breaking election laws and demanding they provide information about voters whose ballots were impacted by Election Day printer issues."

But, one of the most critical wins for Democrats was Sec. of State; the position controls state elections and Republican candidate and a Trump denier Mark Finchem had repeatedly said he may not certify some elections. With that area worsening on a daily basis, the Washington Post corroborates the problem in this piece, "Election denial is reaching new levels of absurdity in Arizona." Here's their

take...

"Arizona is home for many of the most fervent true believers in the election fraud myth. Their ire is directed toward election authorities in Maricopa County, home of Phoenix, where roughly 60 percent of the state’s votes are cast. After the 2020 election, the purveyors of the fraud narrative pushed the state legislature to authorize the so-called audit of the county’s vote. That effort confirmed Joe Biden’s victory, but it did nothing to quell the faithful’s suspicions."

That was followed by what WaPo calls the "fraud squad," illegal electors, led by gubernatorial candidate, Kari Lake. She, along with the Trump supported gang of mock politicians lost, and as far as I am concerned, Arizona is saved...for the time being. We still have a Republican legislature to deal with and Governor-elect Katie Hobbs has indicated her plan to work with them. Being the self-designated state pessimist, I have my doubts but unlimited hope for turning Arizona blue.

Peace Through Democracy

 

For those who don't want peace, there should be a trap door to oblivion...

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

 

Thankful for those who contribute to Democracy and the future of a free world.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Should We Cancel Thanksgiving This Year? NO but...

 

Starting with the corruptive enigma that almost brought down this country, Donald Trump has decided to run for President again.

I, and millions more can't be thankful for that.

I am not thankful for the amount of animal abuse and cruelty that is going on in the U,S, and in the world. In this country an estimated 115 million animals in science labs are killed every year for chemical, drug, food, and cosmetics research. Every 60 seconds, one animal suffers abuse; Every year, more than 10 million animals die from abuse in the US alone; There are over 10,000 puppy mills in the United States.

Millions are definitely not thankful for this. And I do not see how anyone could abuse an innocent animal; it takes a sick human being to do something like this.

Next, the idiot Elon Musk, a leader in electric vehicles, recently bought Twitter and is slowly but surely dismantling one of the best social medias the world has known.

Again, myself and millions can't be thankful for that.

A number of viruses, infections, new variants and most recently a deadly fungus threaten the U.S. population. How did it start and then spread so fast?

Once more, millions recognize that beginning with the pandemic and continuing with the current onslaught of calamities must, to some degree, be blamed on anti-vaxxers that we certainly can't be thankful for.

A recent blue tsunami in the November election is something to be thankful for, but the GOP although barely winning the House, does open the door to idiocies like the Hunter Biden investigation being planned by Jim Jordan.

Certainly nothing to be thankful for on either side of the aisle.

And then there are Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert, the shallow and brainless Bobbsey twins that barely tip the meter of double-digit IQs.

If you really searched high and low, there is absolutely no way to be thankful for these two idiots. 

Look at gun violence. With two recent incidents of mass shootings at the Univ. of Virginia and another at LGBTQ Club, Club Q, eight are dead along with multiple injuries. There have been 39,005 gun violence deaths so far this year and 34,706 injuries from gun violence.

No one should be thankful for the National Rifle Assn. and its head, Wayne LaPierre, as well as the minions that serve him. Also, those gun nuts out there who have blocked responsible gun legislation.

Perhaps the most pressing problem the world has ever had, climate change is drying up lakes that are critical for reservoirs in the U.S. and causing weather calamities that are changing lives around the world. Although the Republicans take the lead in the denial of this issue. the Democrats have also dragged their feet. WHO estimates that half of the world’s population will be living in water-stressed areas by 2025.

How could anyone possibly be thankful for this.

The U. S. has a Supreme Court that has moved so far to the right there are calls for impeachment for at least two judges, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito. In the court's recent decision to in effect repeal the abortion act, Roe v. Wade, millions of women have been compromised, and they are mad as hell. They showed their anger in the recent election by turning back the expected red tide.

Yes, there are millions who are not thankful that the right to control their own bodies has been taken away from them.

Democracy is slowly dying, made possible by the autocratic government of Donald Trump's administration in the White House, supported vigorously by the Republican Party. 

Who could want their rights taken away from them and end up living like basketball star Brittney Griner has been forced to do? But this is the way they do it in a fascist government.

And the last entry leads to the question of whether Americans could live without their right to vote. If Republicans have their way vote will be restricted for some constituents; as an example, the black vote.

I am not thankful for the many laws the GOP has managed to pass and the new drawing of voting districts just to favor the right.

There are more I know but this is enough for now. 

Back to my original question, NO we shouldn't cancel Thanksgiving. What we must do is be thankful that we still have the right to fight tyranny and make it a 2023 resolution to try and mend the fences that have been erected by both the Republicans and Democrats, and return to the use of the two words negotiate and compromise. Without them, we are a lost nation. 

 

Will Extremism Haunt The Republican Party To Self-Destruction?

New York Times columnist, Charles M. Blow, says, "Extremism Is on the Rise … Again." And here I thought it had never abated. But Blow, being the excellent journalist he is, qualifies his headline, written before the Nov. 8 elections, citing one startling fact...

"There are 291 election deniers on the ballot."

You can see the 291 deniers in the "on the ballot" link, above, with names you will recognize like Kevin McCarthy, Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Ron DeSantis, Kari Lake, Herschel Walker; you get the idea. But Blow reports...

In a major speech Wednesday night, President Biden described election denial as “the path to chaos in America.” “It’s unprecedented,” he said. “It’s unlawful. And it’s un-American.” But in truth, the extremism, racism and white nationalism are neither un-American nor unfamiliar.

There are comparisons with the William Howard Taft administration in 1908, later Woodrow Wilson, who campaigned on an “America First” platform, which soon became "associated not just with isolationism, but also with the Ku Klux Klan, xenophobia and fascism." Wilson was a racist from the South and is measured against Donald Trump who Blow says...

"is one of the worst presidents — if not the worst — that this country has ever had."

More matching between Wilson and Trump...

It was Wilson who screened “The Birth of a Nation” at the White House, a film that pushed the “Lost Cause” narrative and fueled the rebirth of the Klan.

 Assessing threats of political violence and rising extremism on the far-right...

Trump hosted a screening of “2,000 Mules” — a fact-checker-debunked documentary that purported to show widespread voter fraud carried out by “mules” who stuffed ballot boxes with harvested ballots during the last presidential election — at Mar-a-Lago, which Trump has called the Southern White House. That film has helped boost his followers’ belief in his lie about the 2020 election.

Civil war has been talked up by Republicans and now they are targeting their own with in-fighting over the upcoming Dec. 6, runoff between Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and Herschel Walker. This is a must win for the GOP and it all boiled over recently between Mitch McConnell and Rick Scott of Florida...

"A long-simmering, mostly private tension between the two men and their allies came to a head this week as their respective political consultants resorted to publicly insulting each other, particularly over how each was approaching the upcoming Georgia election."

Democrats would welcome Republicans keeping their extremism internally as long

as there is no spillover to the rest of the country. Annihilating each other could be the answer to saving our democracy. Neither Trump nor Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has offered Walker help, and some say the GOP big guns are not so enthusiastic about Herschel Walker because his win will not give them control of the Senate. And finally, more talk of civil war, this time between Republicans...

"Marjorie Taylor Greene says she is ready [to] unleash a civil war in the Republican Party after its poor showing in the midterms.

"The Georgia congresswoman also indicated she would throw her support behind House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy in an interview with Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast."

Have you heard the talk recently from a past GOP congressman who said Kevin McCarthy will be Speaker of the House in name only? He said Marjorie Taylor Greene will be the actual Speaker.

Did anyone see that coming? 

Donald Trump vs. Ron DeSantis...Duel Of The Dictators

 

The Guardian thinks there will be "blood on the floor" because Republicans can't decide between Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis for 2024. Trump has suffered from the much-promised red wave in this month's election that didn't happen. GOP officials across the country are also finally getting tired of Trump's continued...

"conspiracy theories, the investigations into his businesses and political actions, and his attacks on his most threatening challenger, DeSantis."

The Guardian reports there is concern his divisiveness is worse than in the 2020 election making him unelectable. On the other hand there is the fear that Trump's loyal followers will stick with him to the end and upend the 2024 Primary. Here's what rural Iowa chair of the Howard County Republican party, Neil Shaffer, said...

“Honestly, Trump’s got a lot of baggage, self-inflicted. Had he taken the loss gracefully, and held his tongue, and didn’t further these conspiracy theories, he probably could have been a president again, with an interim of Biden.”

RawStory believes Florida Gov. Ron (the despot) DeSantis can "weaken and wear down Trump by essentially ignoring him until the primary campaign begins in earnest," In my book, there is nothing worse than being ignored; the way Donald Trump craves attention he would go berzerk in no time. But, also in my book, there is only one person as ruthless and corrupt, possibly more, than Trump and that is DeSantis. He has shown his colors as Florida's autocrat-in-chief.

DeSantis vs, Trump: The battle for the 2024 Republican nomination has already begun...

But Neil Shaffer says...

“I honestly am a big fan of Governor DeSantis and have been for several months just following through this last campaign. Fresh face. Has the same kind of agenda as Trump without all the baggage.”

If Shaffer thinks DeSantis isn't carrying baggage, he's been under a rock. How about his fascist moves in Florida to control what teachers can teach?; Only what DeSantis thinks is right. And the migrant flight to Martha's Vineyard for which there is a large sum of money still in question. And here's the biggie; DeSantis now thinks he is God. The New York Times says, "Ron DeSantis’s God Complex" with the following scenario...

"Tweeted by his wife, Casey, with the apparent expectation that it would draw notice and go viral, it casts DeSantis not merely as a model and promoter of selected (and selective) religious principles — that’s commonplace for Republican leaders — but as a divine instrument, a holy messenger, fashioned precisely into his current form and set specifically on his present mission by God."

This is not only baggage, it's like a trunk full of transgressions. With DeSantis in

the White House you can say goodbye to democracy and the rights you normally enjoy on a daily basis. Back to Donald Trump, Terri Burl was an early member of Women for Trump. As chair of her local Republican party branch in northern Wisconsin, but as avid a supporter as she was then, she is no longer a Trump follower. Here's her take...

Burl is not so sure that Trump would win the primaries but she predicts a bitter fight that could further damage the Republican party.

“If these two guys are the ones that are left, going back and forth, I think it’s gonna be brutal. There will be a lot of blood on the floor,” she said.

One can only hope there will be two distinct puddles. 

Clips From Nasty Jack Buzz: Gun Violence

 

The night of Nov. 13, 2022, three people were shot and killed on the campus of the University of Virginia. Two others were injured. The three dead were football players. The shooter, Christopher Darnell Jones, is in custody. Yahoo!News says...

"A former student athlete accused of fatally shooting three University of Virginia football players was able to legally buy two guns after failing a background check last year and trying to get a handgun while underage four years ago, according to the gun shop that sold him the firearms."

And then only hours later, four University of Idaho students were found dead in an

off-campus house. CNN reports...

Moscow [Idaho] police said they are investigating the deaths as homicides, but did not provide any other information about what happened. As of midday Monday, no suspect was in custody. Anyone with information about the case has been asked to contact police.

Two gun violence murder scenes so close together, it was hard for the media to decide which to concentrate on. It is no doubt the Idaho killings that will receive the most focus until the shooter is caught. Authorities called it senseless killings but did not get into the basics that lead to this kind of brutality resulting in unlimited bloodshed. I looked at the Gun Violence Archive and this is the gun violence activity in only the last 72 hours. The list is almost endless with 10 pages.

The hard numbers are 39,005 gun violence deaths so far this year. There were 34,706 injuries from gun violence. Of these 285 children (age 0-11) were killed, 627 injured. Added to this teens (age 12-17), 1,194 dead, 3,354 injured. There are 390 million guns out on U.S. streets with a population of 329 million people. America rules the world as the Czar of guns and gun violence. This is not a reputation most citizens of this country want, but are comatose when it comes to action. 

I have selected a few posts done on gun violence, as follows:

This one actually came to pass in the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection of the U.S. Capitol, "Gun violence bloodshed threatened if 2020 goes to Democrats." Here's an excerpt...

You would expect no less from Fox News and other conservative news outlets than to suggest gun violence bloodshed should the Democrats win big in 2020. It's looking likely that they will so these anarchistic terrorists are "threatening mass violence and a bloody people’s revolt in the streets."

And turning back to 2018, "American Medical Association asks for ban on assault weapons." It's about time the people who witness gun violence firsthand get in the act. Here's a startling clip...

The ban of assault weapons in the U.S. today should be a given based on the number of school children killed by one of these weapons in 2018 alone. Kids all over the country are expressing their fear of going to school because they are afraid they will be the next victim. Just a couple of years ago some youngsters were scared to face the school bully. That bully has now decided to arm himself and wipe out as many as 44 students.

Are COVID-19 deaths more relevant than gun deaths? Comparing gun deaths

to Covid deaths, I cite Donald Trump, then in the Oval Office, because of his reluctance to acknowledge the pandemic, as leading the American public into a state of apathy similar to the gun violence problem. Here's a selection from that post...

And here we go again says Charlie Warzel in the New York Times...

"The coronavirus scenario I can’t stop thinking about is the one where we simply get used to all the dying."

And therein rests the problem. The American public was tricked into indifference over the deaths from gun violence by Wayne LaPierre, the NRA head, and his minions. and once again when Donald Trump refused to address the coronavirus pandemic. Unfortunately both gun violence and the Covid virus continue to spread. 

Here are all my gun violence posts to read...