Shooting the Moon: The Nuclear Option

Here's a strategy for you:  You force the Republicans to abandon the "filibuster" which means requiring 60 votes for a Supreme Court nominee (not staying up all night in a diaper talking about Green Eggs and Ham) and then you get this right wing lunatic Justice making the Court in Scalia's image.

He started it

Then you bring a Roe v Wade case and, of course lose it, making abortion illegal either nationwide, or more likely in Bible Belt states.


Then you watch as the knuckle draggers in the Rust Belt and even some parts of the South finally realize what they have wrought with their sweetheart, the Donald.


Then you take back the House and the Senate in 2018 and then...
Then you have no filibuster in the Senate and you pass the law which makes the Supreme Court virtually term limited. You can't fire Supreme Court justices (Article III, section 1) but you can pass a law without amending the Constitution to add new justices with each new President, say, two during his first term and two during his second term and only the 9 most recently appointed get to vote.


So then, you have recognized the truth about the Court, that it is every bit as political as the executive or the legislature.  But you have wrested control of the Court from the past and made it respond to the needs of the present.


Of course, once you have Congress, you can work toward defeating Trump on everything else.


You will say this is risking everything, delivering all power into the hands of the Republicans who will then need only 51 Senate votes to deliver whatever they want. I must answer: How different is that from what you have now? At least it will be clear there have been no collaborators, when and if the end to their power comes.

Brave Up Dems: Grow Some Balls

So President Trump goes on national TV to announce his nominee for the Supreme Court. A FANTASTIC guy. Really terrific. And if the Democrats, FOR ONCE, would just cooperate with the Republicans then we can get this guy on the court, repeal Roe v Wade and establish a theocracy and be done with it. Just make the deal.

Mr. Trump can negotiate this.

And how did the Democrats respond?
Did they break into tears?
Did their chins tremble?
Did their voices get all choked up?

No. They said they would give the new guy "careful consideration" because, unlike the Republicans, they are fair minded people who want the government to work as the Constitution directs and they will advise and consent. Mostly, they'll consent, in the end, because, after all, they are meek and they will not inherit the earth but will bend over and drop their drawers so the Republicans can have their way.

Crude? Sure. But that's what the Dems need now. You are faced with crude, don't faint and turn pale. Stand up and start swinging.

What Senator Shaheen should say:

The Republican President has nominated a candidate he hopes to place on the Supreme court to make good on his campaign promise to create a Court which will reverse Roe v Wade and outlaw abortion.  The Republican Senate refused to vote on Mr. Obama's nominee who was uncommitted on this, in a move which clearly stated the new willingness to recognize the reality we all saw but refused to name: Namely, the Supreme Court is a political body. It's members vote along Party lines and they do not, as they claim simply call balls and strikes. Each new member redefines the strike zone and right now we've got 4 Democrats and 4 Republicans and that's the way it's going to stay until President Trump is either re elected or defeated. If they want to try the Nuclear Option, let them. They want a real revolution in this country, come at us. Let's get down to it.

Four sure votes on any issue: Politics pure and simple

But do you think any Democrat is willing to say this?
When you think about it, there is actually some bipartisan cooperation in Congress, now and then. Sometimes a Congressman will surprise you. But Supreme Court justices do not surprise you. They vote exactly how you expect they'll vote, because you know their politics, their philosophy.
Our Democratic Senators will  dance around the truth--we'll try to give the impression we are "fair minded" so the Republicans don't invoke the Nuclear Option.
What you have to ask yourself is this: Do you think there is a reason they haven't invoked it already?

Join the Movement! Liberty League Manifesto

Reading about the origins and history of the Tea Party movement, it is evident why this reactionary, libertarian movement had such success, in its own terms and was able to paralyze the Obama Presidency.




Our Flag



Their Flag

There were thousands of people involved, organized only loosely, but marketed brilliantly, across the country and meeting locally.


The idea of the movement was not a centrally controlled ideology, like the communists of yore, but a decentralized faith in certain ideas--low taxes, low to no government.  It was animated by the government's decision to rescue the economy and bail out various irresponsible financial institutions which would pretty clearly have taken the entire American (and world) economy down with them as they collapsed.


Anyone who saw "The Big Short" or read the book knows how richly the credit rating corporations (Moody and Standard and Poors) deserved to die, along with some of Lehman Brothers, Saloman Brothers type institutions. Nobody went to jail, which is likely one reason Mr. Trump won in 2016. People were angry and President Obama failed to punish enough people.  It was like Gerald Ford pardoning Nixon--but this time people were not simply morally outraged--they had suffered and wanted revenge.

Now we need a movement from the other side, from the left.

Here is the manifesto, our shared ideas and goals:

1. We need a government run health insurance plan: Medicare for All, which anyone who wants it can sign on for. If commercial insurance companies can offer a better deal, go for it, but for those citizens who prefer it, the government will put you on Medicare.

2.Diversity, ethnic, religious and racial is good.  We think we are stronger, less boring and more interesting and vigorous as a result of those striving immigrants who invigorate our nation. This does not mean we do not believe in borders or we intend to offer immigrants a free ride (which, by and large, they do not ask for.) We have two problems here: A/ Those illegal immigrants who are already here.  B/ Immigrants of the future who wish to come here. We cannot possibly absorb a billion Indians or Chinese so we must limit the numbers, but we'll do this not by religion or even country of origin or even by the presence of family in the United States but by virtue of what the immigrant has to offer in the future or has demonstrated in the past. So a hard working Mexican who has helped build houses or skyscrapers for 30 years without papers has earned his citizenship.  We do not need rapists, violent criminals or even dependent unemployable immigrants.

3. Nobody should be harassed by the government or by commercial entities or by fellow citizens for things about themselves they cannot change if they wanted to--race, or sexual orientation. That doesn't mean we will pay for hormone or surgical treatment for sexual change therapy, but we will not allow these people to be harassed.

4. Abortion should be kept legal, but we reject infanticide. Where you draw the line is open to discussion.  Ideally, the government or private organizations like Planned Parenthood should be contracted to prevent unwanted pregnancies. Ideally, every 12 year old girl should be fitted with an IUD when she gets her HPV vaccine.


5. Government ought to promote the common good: Medicare and Social Security have been the two best government solutions to the problems of healthcare and support of people who have grown too old to work. These programs should be strengthened. In the case of Social Security its financial security should be guaranteed by taxing incomes beyond the current $118,000 up to $250,000 which will insure its financial health until 2050.

6. Eternal war should be abandoned.  We cannot and ought not be the world's policeman and we should withdraw our bases from Korea, Japan, Europe.  Our military should be a force which can intervene across the globe for short wars but it should not be built for wars of occupation or regimen change.  Laws should be written to foster responsible use of drones which are a cost effective way of projecting power.  The "war on terror" is no more a war than the "war on crime." It is unending and is, in its essence an ongoing police effort. We may need military forces to fight it but we'll need smart policing to sustain it. To that end police forces (like the NYPD) should be as important and well funded as the military.

7. Nuclear proliferation should be discouraged.

8. Climate change may or may not be real. It doesn't matter. We ought to behave as if it is, because economically, it will be a boon to our economy to shift from coal and oil to wind and solar and natural gas. Those coal miners are smart enough to build wind turbines and solar panels.

9. Science is the best way to approach thinking about problems like public health (which includes vaccines) and arguments should be based on evidence rather than fantasized "facts" which serve the purpose of the advocate.

10. Cows and Grass should not have votes:  Our government ought to represent the people who live within the geographic confines of our nation and the Constitution should apply wherever the country has an official residence, i.e. off shore possessions like embassies and Gitmo. To that end, the electoral college should be abandoned and state legislators and United State Congressman should be elected as our United States senators are elected: at large.  Representatives should no longer represent narrow interests of some Iowa county with more cows than people. We can render irrelevant gerrymandering by at large elections. But we ought to go farther, eventually, by considering whether our current state borders are dysfunctional anachronisms and we might think about redrawing our governmental precincts in a way which groups in a more meaningful way, recognizing the rural voters in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Maryland may have more in common than any of those voters have in common with Cleveland, Philadelphia or Baltimore.

There is the manifesto.
I'm working on the flag, but the image on top will be the main thing, maybe with a scarlet background. I'm working on that.


We need help. As Arlo Guthrie noted, movements can get started without leaders.

Wow! This is Just Like Celebrity Apprentice: You're Fired!

Hot damn! I knew this would get good. 
President Trump is just loads of fun.

He fires the acting Attorney General, Sally Yates, thereby providing her with the best line on her resume for ever more,  and setting her up for consideration by the Nobel Peace Prize committee and I'm looking for the youtube of him calling her into the Oval Office and shouting, "You're fired!"

He's just got to get Jeff Sessions in place who has no qualms about banning Muslims. He might ban Mexicans and rapists and atheists, too. Definitely, Mormons. Mormons cannot get a visa. They have multiple wives, which is okay, as long as you don't have them all at the same time. Just wait til those Mormons trying to come back into the country from their missions to Somalia or wherever, where they probably got radicalized and learned how to build bombs, just wait til they try to get back into the country. Joke's on them. 

The ban on people from Iraq, Syria, Iran and I forget which other trouble making countries is not complete, so it's not about being Muslim, because, after all, exceptions will be made for Christians, which proves this is definitely not about Muslims, just Muslim from the wrong countries, trouble making, threatening, Islamic terrorist Muslims need not apply. Which is, well, every Muslim from those named countries.

But Saudi Arabia, which supplied 19 of those guys on the airplanes on 9/11, that is exempted. So it's not about Muslims, but about terrorists. Got that? 

What I want to know is when Chuck Schumer heard Sally had been fired, did he cry?

Name Me a Democrat with Balls

How the Republicans have been howling with laughter over Chuck Schumer, "leader" of the Democrats in the Senate tearing up with impotent rage over Trump's Muslim ban. 

Trump himself, off course, could not resist pointing to Schumer as the quintessential Democratic wimp, leader of a party of wimps. 

And, for once, Trump was right.

This is why Trump will win a second term. This is why Trump will succeed. The loyal opposition is simply incapable of anything more than whimpering. 

Look at the Democrats. 
Schumer is not just a weenie, but he's a not at all bright weenie.  How did he ever get to be a Senator from New York, much less the leader of the Democrats? The fact they chose this jellyfish says more than enough about the Democrats.

I love Bernie and he once had enough balls to stand up to Trump and his gang, but he is seventy and tired and not a threat. 

Al Franken has never actually had a rapier wit, and is often reduced to calling people like Rush Limbaugh a  "big, fat, liar." That hardly eviscerates Limbaugh--on the contrary, more evidence of impotence...the eight year old's most emphatic insult.

Steny Hoyer is old now. Chris van Hollan is about as bold as George Plimpton in a snit. 

Barney Frank once had balls, but he became  dissipated  and morbidly obese and he simply ran out of steam.

Where is the thunder from the left? 

When Trump takes "bold" action by banning Muslims and the Democrats respond by simply breaking down in tears, surrounding themselves with women in head scarves who testify they are now officially "scared," do the Democrats not prove Trump's case for him? These Democrats are simply too timid to protect anyone.

He had a pair

Americans are nowhere near as flaccid and helpless as Congressional Democrats. These Democrats are the weepy, helpless girls in the horror movie who cannot stand up and strike a blow but simply cower and curl up into a fetal ball, weeping as the villain  stalks about the room. 

No question about his

I'm ashamed to admit I'm a Democrat, in this company. 

"Oh, do you wet your pants when Donald Trump comes into the room? Does Steve Bannon make you sweat and tremble? If ISIS  attacks will you break down and cry? You're not going to protect anyone by crying." 

Beyond doubt: But another Republican

Tell me, fellow reader, who am I missing among the few Democrats left in the House and the less than 50 in the Senate who has any balls?  Closest I can come is Elizabeth Warren, and that's a sorry state of affairs when the only Democrat with balls has two X chromosomes. I'm all for bold and nervy women, but why do the Democrats' women always have to wear the pants?

First, The Movement Needs a Flag

The T Party movement was all about marketing.  It's central message made no sense, really: That government is best which governs least, or not at all. That may have made sense to Jefferson, who saw America as an eternally bucolic nation, peopled by families on farms, honest working people living as he did on Monticello. But in a continental nation of 300 million, we actually need a functioning government. And we have to sell that notion.

Our Flag

Their Flag

Actually, Donald Trump has signed on to the idea of an activist government; it's just his idea of what a government should do is puerile: A government should make deals with each and every company with a factory and then it should build walls around the continent and make sure that the factory workers are put back to work building the same air conditioners and automobiles they've always made and sell those to their countrymen without competition from the higher tech models made by robots in China.

In that sense, Trump is no different from the plantation owners of the ante Bellum South, who thought they could freeze time.

As Bruce Catton observed, the slave owners in Georgia were unable to face reality.

In the 1860s the leaders of the cotton belt made one of the most prodigious miscalculations in recorded history. On the eve of the era of applied technologies, in which more and more work is done with fewer people and less effort, they made war to preserve the day of chattel slavery - the era of gang labor, with its reliance on the same use of human muscles that built the pyramids. The lost cause was lost before it started to fight. Inability to see what is going on in the world can be costly.” 

― Bruce Catton, Waiting for the Morning Train

President Trump has no firmer grip on reality today.

But to oppose him, we need a carnival, to appeal to those who need that. Remember the T party clowns in their three cornered hats?  They were waving those splendid yellow flags, expropriated from the American Revolution. Symbols can be useful, potent even.  You can put them on bumper stickers and T shirts and rally the troops around them.

Here's the flag

I like the statue of Liberty flag--wave that around to remind people we are a nation of immigrants, and there's that poem at its base--give me your tired, your poor--and all that. And rally round. Mother of exiles, lifts her lamp beside the golden door.
Can't you see it?
Let's start with a flag, and maybe some of those foam rubber head bands and we can march.

“

Is It Time for the Armbands?

The King of Denmark, Professor Google tells us, never actually rode through the streets of Copenhagen wearing a yellow Star of David armband after the Nazi occupiers decreed all Jews in Denmark must wear armbands, but he did say, when asked about the decree, "Well, then all Danes must wear armbands."

The question is now, have we come to the point where all Americans of good faith (as opposed to the dimwits who voted for Trump) should wear some sort of armband (a red crescent perhaps) in solidarity of our Muslim citizens.

Elizabeth Warren, bless her heart, has said she will be among the first to register as a Muslim if Trump tries to register Muslims, but you know how he'll handle that one: "Oh, Pocahontas, first she's an Indian. Now she's a Muslim." 


But the armband thing, that could be effective.


Trouble is, you'd see them in the cities but not out there in Trump country, where the smartest animals are the coyotes. (I know, Maud, you will say that is an invidious comparison, as coyotes are clearly smarter than Trump voters, and that insults the intelligence of the coyotes. But, please.)

The thing is, we had marches in some cities protesting the banning of Muslims from entering the country, or even re-entering the country, but it barely made the news in most places.

For the first two or three years of the Civil War, Lincoln kept trying to find a general who would fight.  Ultimately, he found Grant, whose detractors called him a drunk and a butcher. Lincoln replied he'd like to find what whiskey Grant drank; he'd send a bottle to all his other generals.

That's what we need now, a Grant, and probably a Sherman. We need leaders who will fight.

Look Ma! I'm a soldier!

Until then, resistance may have to come from the little people, like you and me, and our armbands.


Speaking of Professor Google--Google's flagstaff today shows Fred Korematsu because it's his birthday today. And who is Fred? He led the resistance to the internment of Japanese Americans during WWII, the last time hysteria against "the other" seized America. Our response then, was cowardly and intolerant, in a country which was far whiter and demonstrably more racist and about half the population of today's America. But that internment was a cautionary tale.

About those armbands: Haven't been able to find any on line, but if there's a profit in it, likely that won't be a problem. Just let Café press get a hold of this and we are off to the races.