Tag Archives: George W. Bush

May 29, 2026 · 10:32 PM

Lazarus Orwell

Lazarus – Hebrew, “God will help.”

“Name Your Baby”, Lareina Rule

“If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself.”

Winston Smith in “1984”, George Orwell

In the 1994 midterm elections, the Republican Party achieved something they hadn’t in nearly four decades: they won the majority of seats in both houses of congress.  And they won big; a “Super Majority” that clearly showed an early rebuke of President Bill Clinton’s agenda.  Newt Gingrich, a veteran politician from Georgia, was elected House leader.  At the start of 1995, Connie Chung, then co-anchor of the CBS Evening News, interviewed Gingrich’s parents at their home.  Puffing on cigarettes and speaking barely above a stage whisper, Gingrich’s mother, Kathleen, noted her son didn’t particularly like Clinton or First Lady Hillary Clinton.  In fact, she said, he had an extreme disdain for Hillary and said he’d called her a “bitch”.

The national reaction was explosive.  Gingrich himself never confirmed whether or not he’d actually said that, but condemned for taking advantage of two people who weren’t “media savvy”.  How media savvy does someone need to be, replied Chung, to know they’re speaking with a nationally renowned journalist and have three cameras set up around them?

But Chung had unknowingly orchestrated her own demise.  CBS almost immediately terminated her.

In 2004, as then-President George W. Bush was in the midst of his reelection campaign, Dan Rather, another veteran journalist and anchor of the CBS Evening News (Chung’s former colleague), dived into Bush’s so-called military record.  After graduating from Harvard in 1968, Bush immediately joined the Texas National Guard.  The Vietnam War was raging, and young men were being drafted into military service.  Getting a position in a National Guard unit was highly coveted and difficult to obtain.  According to…well, himself…Bush completed his first stint in the Guard in 1972 and reenlisted, before moving to Alabama to assist in the presidential campaign of George Wallace.  He then joined the Alabama National Guard and supposedly got suspended for missing an annual physical exam.  But what happened after that is largely unknown.  Bush’s records mysteriously disappeared.

Dan Rather had gained fame in 1961, as he delivered live coverage of Hurricane Carla’s landfall in Texas.  He began anchoring the CBS Evening News in 1981.  The outrage over his questions into Bush’s military service was palpable.  The same political and social conservatives who screamed over Bill Clinton’s lack of military service were suddenly offended with Rather’s report.

At the start of 2005, CBS dismissed Rather.  For the second time in a decade, the news conglomerate had allowed themselves to be intimidated by a key political figure.

All of that nonsense came to light recently, as controversy fell atop Stephen Colbert, host of “The Late Show” on CBS.  A few months ago Colbert interviewed Texas politician James Talarico who is running for U.S. Senate.  However CBS didn’t broadcast the interview.  Apparently CBS hadn’t heard of this thing called the internet and something else called YouTube.  Its legal advisors claimed the interview was in violation of the Federal Communication Commission’s Fairness Doctrine – a creed that mandates broadcast networks devote equal time to views on national issues.  Generally the rule applied only to news programs; talk shows were exempt because they were considered entertainment venues.

Until now.

If either previous presidents Bill Clinton or Barack Obama got upset every time a public media figure mocked or even criticized them, they’d be incarcerated for life in mental health hospitals.  In contrast the administration of current President Donald Trump is obviously of fragile spirit.  Colbert has been a vocal critic of the president.

CBS canceled “The Late Show”, which had been broadcasting since 1993.  Last week was the final telecast.  They claimed low ratings, but I don’t believe that.  My followers know what a strong free speech advocate I am.  It’s not just the writer in me – it’s the human being in my soul; someone born and raised in a country that values the right to speak freely.

Politicians utilizing their power to coerce a media into compliance or silence is the essence of totalitarianism.  Other countries allow this to happen.  China or Russia sound familiar?

I’ve never been a fan of Colbert, but I’m still angry over his show’s cancellation.  It’s obvious what happened.  But what should we, as free people, do about it?  How much of this madness are we supposed to tolerate?

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May 16, 2026 · 3:41 PM

Draft Well

Recently President Trump signed an Executive Order that will impact military readiness in the U.S.  Beginning in December 2026 all able-bodied males in the country will be automatically registered for Selective Service (the military draft) upon turning 18.  The late former President Jimmy Carter reinstituted the Selective Service system in 1980, requiring all males born in the U.S. since 1960 to register for the draft within 30 days of their 18th birthday.  A number of lawsuits against the system in the following decades have failed to reverse the policy.

The penalties for failing to register are severe:

  • Fines up to $250,000 and/or 5 years in prison.
  • Ineligible for federal jobs and many state, local, and municipal positions.
  • Ineligible for federal student financial aid (FAFSA), including Pell Grants and federal student loans.
  • Non-citizens can be denied citizenship (naturalization).
  • Roughly 40 states and Washington, D.C., deny driver’s licenses or renewal for non-registration.
  • Ineligible for training under the federal Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act.

Yes…a $250,000 fine and up to 5 years in prison…for failing to register to serve (unwillingly) in the military of a nation that still maintains an incredibly unequal justice system and wealth structure.  (Understand that Casey Anthony and George Zimmerman each murdered someone and got away with it.)

Again, this system only applies to men. 

Now Trump wants to make it more difficult to evade compulsory military service.  Well…he should know.  Like his Republican predecessor, George W. Bush, he did just about everything he could to avoid compulsory military service more than a half century ago.

One of my best friends, Preston*, has two 20-something sons and voted for Trump during all three of his presidential runs.  As the 2024 elections approached, he expressed concern that a Kamala Harris presidency would result in military action in Ukraine; meaning Harris would enact the military draft, and his sons could be impacted.  I was concerned about that, too, but I was more concerned that Trump would get back into office and take military action against Iran; the same way Bush invaded Iraq under the false pretense of protecting the world from an Iraqi-based nuclear war.

I was right.

Trump got into office and – under the guise of safeguarding the globe against an Iranian-inspired nuclear Armageddon, as well as defending Israel – attacked the Middle Eastern county.  Now, Preston is even more worried.

So am I.

In August of 1990, Iraq unexpectedly invaded Kuwait.  Fearful they were the next targets, the Saudi royal family fled their palaces and asked the U.S. for help.  As that year came to an end, then-President George H.W. Bush sent troops into the Saudi desert.  Ultimately Iraqi forces surrendered without much of a fight, but about 300 U.S. service personnel died in battle.  Shortly before the conflict erupted, Saudi leadership – still safely ensconced abroad – demanded that our people in uniform remove emblems of the U.S. flag from their attire.  They somehow found it offensive.  Bush bowed to the Saudi sheiks and ordered the removals.

Pull our boys out, was the first response from most U.S. citizens, including me.  It was an outrage.  If it hadn’t been for American demand for oil, the Saudis would still be living in ornate tents in the desert, picking sand fleas out of their ass.  The Bush family’s loyalty to the Saudi regime became apparent in the immediate aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, when the Bush Administration allowed several Saudi nationals to leave the U.S., while other travelers remained trapped at airports and hotels.

Shortly before the Persian Gulf War began, I visited my local gym and heard one young man ask another, “Ready to go?” in reference to the conflict.

I was 27 then and thought it was a real possibility knowing our political leaders’ penchant for war.  My father – who had been drafted into the U.S. Army and sent to Korea nearly four decades earlier – was also concerned.  He became especially incensed when the Saudi royal family demanded U.S. military personnel remove the American flag emblems from their uniforms; cursing the clan in both English and Spanish.

Throughout Bill Clinton’s presidency, his right-wing adversaries condemned his lack of military experience; labeling him with that dreaded “draft-dodger” moniker.  From 1968 to 1970, he was a Rhodes Scholar at the University of Oxford where he openly protested the Vietnam War.  But a large number of American expatriates did.  When he returned to his native Arkansas, he placed his name back into the draft lottery (to maintain his “political viability”) and drew a high enough number not to be sent into the conflict.

As the 2000 presidential election arose, conservatives were eager to prop up only one man: then-Texas Governor George W. Bush.  The eldest son of the nation’s 41st President, George H.W. Bush, the younger Bush graduated from Harvard in 1968 – and found himself eligible for military conscription.  He immediately managed to secure a position in the Texas Air National Guard (at a time when such spots were sparse and difficult to obtain).  After his initial four year stint was over, he reenlisted and then somehow was able to switch to the Alabama National Guard; in part, he later said, to work on the presidential campaign of George Wallace.  That second hitch should have been completed in 1976.  But no real record exists of Bush completing his service.  And then – as things tend to occur – misfortune arrived and Bush’s military records mysteriously disintegrated in a warehouse fire.

Bush’s Vice President, Dick Cheney, also came under scrutiny for his lack of military service.  During the 2000 campaign, Cheney declared he had “other priorities” during the Vietnam fiasco; receiving a number of draft deferments – mostly educational and one because he was a new father.

The same band of right-wingers who excoriated Clinton for his lack of military service weren’t so quick to demand a full accounting from either Bush or Cheney.  Also, in 2000, then Sen. John McCain sought the GOP nomination.  Coming from a long line of U.S. Navy officers, McCain served in Vietnam and was a pilot shot down over Hanoi in 1968, captured by enemy forces and held hostage for five years.  But the Bush political machine had the audacity to question not only McCain’s military service (which was there for all to see) but also his patriotism.  The same flag and country crowd who had demonized Clinton suddenly had no qualms belittling a real American military hero.

Now we come to Trump.  Donald “bone spurs” Trump.

No one has a desire to do something unpleasant – like pay taxes or wait in line at the grocery store.  And certainly nobody wants to go to war.  War is not just ugly; it’s stupid and pointless.

One Saturday evening in the late 1970s, my parents hosted a few friends over for a casual gathering.  Among them was a longtime male friend who brought along a young woman we hadn’t met before.  She seemed pleasant enough.  At some point, during a discussion, the subject of the Vietnam War came up.  The U.S. had just fled Vietnam in an ignominious defeat a few years earlier.  All of the men in the group had served in the U.S. military.  A few of them, including my father, had been drafted.  The aforementioned young woman mentioned that a young man she had been dating about a decade earlier had failed to heed his conscription notice and – apparently feeling intensely patriotic – reported him to some authority.  She said he got drafted anyway.

I remember the brief quiet that settled over our cavernous den.

“Wow,” my father finally muttered.  “How brave of you.”

And the conversation ended.

Don’t ask someone to do something you’re not at least willing to try – which is one reason why men have no business demanding women get pregnant.

I’m genuinely worried about Preston’s sons, as well as for any other young man who may get swept up into this conflict-laden world.  But I’m concerned for the greater population.  Despite all the patriotic bravado, the 2003 Iraq War really was about gaining access to the region’s oil.

I see the same outcome with Iran.

*Name changed

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March 21, 2026 · 5:29 PM

Gladiating

Jacqueline Susann’s 1973 novel “Once Is Not Enough” is filled with enough drama, heartbreak, romance, intrigue and sexual indiscretions to send any family into therapy for decades.  The central character, January Wayne, returns home to New York City after being hospitalized in Switzerland for nearly three years.  That part alone rivals the best (or worst) any Mexican telenovela can deliver.  In many ways the world she left three years earlier hasn’t changed, but in most others, it’s radically different.  As is befitting a Susann story, January encounters a plethora of strange figures: one of the world’s richest women; a vile magazine editor; a hyper-masculine novelist; and a physician with salaciously ulterior motives, among other cretins.  Almost sounds like one of my old family gatherings!

To some extent “Once Is Not Enough” is a commentary on the myriad social upheavals in the U.S. at the time of its publication.  Right now, though, I wonder if many Americans have been suffering from subtle amnesia – or are just innately sadistic.

A generation ago we had a president who launched an unexpected war upon a Middle East nation that – along with a slew of heavy tax breaks for the wealthiest citizens – culminated in the worst economic downturn in almost a century.  George W. Bush used the horrors of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks to justify an invasion of Iraq less than two years later.  To date that fiasco has cost the U.S. an estimated USD 6 trillion.  That’s just in hard U.S. dollars.  But the cost in mental and physical health is immeasurable.

Now we’re at it again.  The Trump Administration has attacked Iran – one of the U.S.’s most loathsome enemies.  Until 1979, we had a cordial diplomatic relationship with Iranian leadership, including the late Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.  He had risen to prominence in the immediate aftermath of World War II and guided Iran into something of a progressive new era.

But Pahlavi had also instituted a repressive dictatorship and exhibited an extravagant lifestyle for him, his family and others in the small elite class.  His ardent efforts to Westernize and secularize Iran, along with depending strongly on the United States, alienated his own people and culminated in a student uprising that forced him and his family into exile.  The same uprising ambushed the U.S. embassy in Tehran in November 1979 that led to holding several Americans hostage for over a year.

It was our first battle with radical Islam and it caught the U.S. completely off-guard.  At the time the “Cold War” was still raging, and the Soviet Union remained the most serious foreign threat.  Iran wasn’t on the radar of diplomatic instability.

Recently the Trump Administration invaded Venezuela to capture its president, Nicolás Maduro, who the world has denounced as an illegitimate leader.  A global coalition of democratic states claims Maduro ascended to the Venezuelan presidency in January 2019 after a rigged election.  Somehow, the 2000 and 2016 presidential elections in the U.S. come to mind whenever I hear the term “rigged election”.

Now Trump has set his sights on two more foes: Cuba and Colombia.  Cuba has been on the American shit-list for over 60 years, and Colombia has a long history of political assassinations and drug trafficking.  Bush had used the excuse of nuclear weaponry to invade Iraq, and even critics later admitted the country was better off without its brutal leader, Saddam Hussein.  The world would be better off without many autocrats – including Trump.

But is it the duty of the U.S. to remove every such character?

We all know the adage that, when old men go to war, young men die.  Right now, though, it seems when the billionaire class goes to war, the middle and lower classes die.

And here we are again.  Once may not be enough in regards to love, sex and a good back rub.  But one war is always one too many.

My first edition copy of “Once Is Not Enough”

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February 1, 2025 · 7:47 PM

Gallery of Nitwits

Well, just like the Earth didn’t self-obstruct when Barack Obama won his two elections, it hasn’t 75 7jpj56exploded now that Donald Trump has returned to the White House.  But at least there was never any (real) question that Obama actually won.  And I’m still feeling dismal.

It’s tough to remain faithful to the democratic process and the American vision of equality and happiness when someone like Trump keeps succeeding.  But this is life on planet Earth and it’s imperfect.  In fact, it’s downright screwy!

I don’t care what anyone says.  In my adult life, I’ve never seen anyone as incompetent or unqualified to claim the title of U.S. President than Donald Trump.  As I’ve stated before, I was embarrassed with George W. Bush in the White House.  But I’m incredibly disgusted with this former real estate magnate / pathetic reality TV star / tax cheat / draft dodger / womanizer in the same role.  U.S. politics has truly descended into madness.

Trump’s cabinet appointments have proven equally unfit for such prestigious and high-profile positions.   Former Congressman Matt Gaetz was the first of Trump’s appointments to come under intense scrutiny – and the first to withdraw his nomination.  Trump had wanted Gaetz to be his Attorney General, the nation’s top law enforcement official, despite not having any experience in the legal field – except as a litigant.

Trump’s second choice for the role, Pam Bondi, is Florida’s former attorney general and a corporate lobbyist.  Like the rest of Trump’s nominees, she’s a devout Trump supporter and apologist, but she actually made it through her confirmation hearing in one piece and is now overseeing the U.S. Justice Department.

For Defense Secretary, Trump picked Pete Hegseth, a former military veteran and FOX New TV host.  He also made it through his confirmation hearing – despite tales of his excessive alcohol consumption and sexual harassment allegations.  In this latter respect, he’s Trump “Light”.

Three other Trump nominees – Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., for Health and Human Services Secretary, Kash Patel for FBI Director, and Tulsi Gabbard for Director of National Intelligence – are facing tougher paths.  Kennedy, son of the late and legendary former U.S. Attorney General, ran as an independent candidate in last year’s presidential race.  But his past comments questioning the efficacy of vaccines, including COVID-19, have come back to haunt worse than one of Trump’s ex-wives.  He’d once declared that AIDS in Africa “is an entirely different disease from Western AIDS” and claimed that work done by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is akin to that of Nazi death camps.  He also propagated a popular conspiracy theory that vaccines cause autism in children.

Patel said recently that, if chosen as FBI Director, he’d terminate as many of the agency’s employees as possible and shut down its headquarters building, before reopening it as a museum to the “deep state”.  That “deep state” reference is common among right-wing conspiracy theorists, especially after FBI investigations into Trump’s antics during his first term in office.

Gabbard, a former Democratic congresswoman from Hawaii and a military veteran, may have the toughest road of all of them.  She has insinuated that Russia had some justification for invading Ukraine three years ago; denouncing the administration of Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky as a “corrupt autocracy”.  She backed Russia’s unfounded claims that the U.S. and Ukraine have collaborated to engage in clandestine biological warfare.

One of my closest friends, Preston*, is a Trump voter who had told me last year that he was concerned – if Vice-President Kamala Harris won the presidency – she’d send U.S. troops into Ukraine.  He has two young adult sons who could face military conscription, if a military draft was enacted – which hasn’t occurred since the early 1970s.  I can identify with that sentiment.  In 1991, I feared something similar would happen with the Persian Gulf War, when I was in my mid-20s.  Preston believes wholeheartedly in Trump (which I don’t hold against him), but I’m worried now that Trump could send U.S. troops into the Middle East to help Israel fight against Iran.  Both those countries have nuclear weapons.

Another disquieting possibility is that Trump will enact the classic Republican tax cuts – that bullshit “trickle-down” economics regimen every GOP official has pushed onto the American people for over a century; the kind that has always shoved the U.S. into financial despair.  It happened with the Great Depression of the 1930s, the savings and loan crisis of the early 1990s, and the Great Recession less than two decades ago.  Trump’s round of tax cuts and deregulation measures during his first term only exacerbated the trauma of the COVID-19 pandemic.  I fear it’s going to happen again, and the U.S. will find itself in more economic distress.

But don’t blame people like me.  I didn’t vote for either Trump or Harris, but – as with Hillary Clinton in 2016 – I have to concede Harris would have been the lesser of two evils.  That’s never a pleasant position in which voters should find themselves, but it’s how I view politics in the U.S.

Now we’ll just have to see what shenanigans occur with Trump 2.0.  Fasten your seatbelts.

*Name changed

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November 8, 2024 · 8:47 PM

Self-Inflicted

“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.”

Sinclair Lewis, 1935

I had a certain sensation deep inside of me; the same kind of feeling when I know something dramatic – either good or bad – is about to happen.  This time it was bad, and I almost felt sick.  Donald Trump has been reelected to the U.S. presidency.  He becomes only the second president in U.S. history to win a second term that didn’t immediately follow the first.  He also has the dubious distinction of being the first indicted criminal to be elected.  Little could be stranger or sadder for the American people.  I suppose, though, that too many people drank that proverbial Kool-Aid offered by the Republican despot; a man who openly admires the likes of Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-Un; who has advocated violence against others; who has threatened to imprison anyone who disagrees with him; who incited a riot nearly four years ago; and who has demonstrated no true respect for average, working Americans.

I am embarrassed by and disgusted with many of my fellow Americans who helped put Trump into office.  The Democratic Party, however, really has no one but themselves to blame for this chaos.  Their leadership stood by as Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders ran for president in 2020.  With all due respect to those two gentlemen, their time had come and gone.  The window to run for and win the U.S. presidency is small.  I felt Biden and Sanders would have better served the country by giving speeches and writing books about the value and importance of democracy and how people like Trump pose the worst threat to our constitutional freedoms.

For the Democrats, the 2020 presidential race began with the most diverse slate of candidates – and ended with the same tired old figures that traditionally represented both parties: old White men.  Now understand I’m a mostly White male and have no qualms about it.  But this nation boasts too varied a population to rely upon the same types of people to lead us.

And it’s not that the U.S. isn’t ready for a female president.  We’re way past ready.  It’s just that the Democrats (and the Republicans for that matter) have never chosen the right women to lead them.  I’ve always said Hillary Clinton was too divisive a figure.  While I loved Bill “Who’s Your Daddy” Clinton, I personally never cared for Hillary.  And, although Kamala Harris made history by becoming the first female vice-president in U.S. history, she didn’t do enough to separate herself from Biden.

In 1993 Canada elected its first female prime minister, Kim Campbell, and highly patriarchal and staunchly Roman Catholic México just elected its first female (and Jewish) president, Claudia Scheinbaum.  Thus far, eighteen other women either have been elected or ascended to the highest office in their respective countries in the Western Hemisphere:

Jeanine Áñez, Bolivia, 2019-20

Rosalía Arteaga, Ecuador, 1997

Michelle Bachelet, Chile, 2006-10 and 2014-18

Dina Boluarte, Peru, since 2022

Sylvanie Burton, Dominica, since 2023

Xiomara Castro, Honduras, since 2022

Violeta Chamorro, Nicaragua, 1990-97

Eugenia Charles, Dominican Republic, 1980-95

Laura Chinchilla, Costa Rica, 2010-14

Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, Argentina, 2007-15

Lidia Gueiler Tejadam, Bolivia, 1979-80

Mireya Moscoso, Panama, 1999-2004

Mia Mottley, Barbados, since 2018

Ertha Pascal-Trouillot, Haiti, 1990-91 (acting president)

Michèle Pierre-Louis, Haiti, 2008-09

Dilma Rousseff, Brazil, 2014-16

Portia Simpson-Miller, Jamaica, 2006-07 and 2012-16

Claudette Werleigh, Haiti, 1995-96

Trump does not represent me – never has and never will.  He has proclaimed total disrespect for people who aren’t exactly like him.  And I’m certainly not like him.  I’m not a wealthy, full-blooded Caucasian womanizer who cheated on his taxes and has disdain for the American military.  I feel that he’s a genuine threat to free speech and the right to vote, but – like most conservatives – has the full support of gun rights advocates.  This latter band of extremists has always placed the value of firearms above free speech and the right to vote – and certainly above the lives of human beings.

One of my concerns with Trump’s return to the White House is that he will implement the so-called Project 2025 – a federal policy agenda created by the Heritage Foundation, a far-right conservative outfit that is a borderline hate group.  Many officials in Trump’s first administration took part in the project’s creation, which demands a complete overhaul of the government based on staunchly conservative ideology.  That philosophy features opposition to the usual causes: abortion and reproductive freedom and queer rights, but also immigration and racial equity.  Moreover, Project 2025 calls for unwarranted surveillance on specific individuals; using force to quell protestors; and targeting journalists who they deem enemies of the state.  This might sound familiar to those schooled in global political history.  They’re the same kind of tactics the Nazis and the former Soviet Union used on its own civilians.  Argentina pursued the same agenda during its “Dirty War”, and North Korea is doing it now.

I don’t know what’s next for America, but I see nothing good on the horizon.  I’m certain my conservative friends and relatives will assume I’m being paranoid, even hysterical.  Yet I felt similar sensations of foreboding when George W. Bush became president in 2000.  And I was right.  The U.S. ended up both in war and a recession.

I’m almost certain it will happen again.

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October 28, 2023 · 5:44 PM

X Matters

The U.S. Supreme Court commenced its latest term October 2, and after the previous two years of drama and shocking decisions, the American populace is wondering what’s next.  Among the upcoming decisions:

Lindke v. Freed – A case in which the Court will decide whether a public official’s social media activity can constitute state action only if the official used the account to perform a governmental duty or under the authority of his or her office.

Murray v. UBS Securities LLC – A case in which the Court will decide whether, under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, a whistleblower must prove his employer acted with a “retaliatory intent” as part of his case in chief to succeed on a retaliation claim.

Rudisill v. McDonough – A case in which the Court will decide whether a veteran who has served two separate and distinct periods of qualifying service is entitled to receive all of the education benefits at once from programs associated with both periods of service.

United States v. Rahimi – A case in which the Court will decide whether 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(8), which prohibits the possession of firearms by persons subject to domestic-violence restraining orders, violates the Second Amendment.  (Both domestic violence experts and gun rights supporters are closely watching this particular case.)

Vidal v. Elster – A case in which the Court will decide whether the refusal to register a trademark under 15 U.S.C. § 1052(c) violates the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment when the mark contains criticism of a government official or public figure.

The 2022 Dobbs decision upended the long-standing belief the High Court always moves the nation forward.  It wasn’t akin to the 1954 Brown decision, which reversed the 1896 Plessy ruling.  It was such a regressive move that even legal scholars remain stunned.  Afterwards, Justice Clarence Thomas – the longest-serving member of the Court and a conservative darling – declared the Dobbs decision opened the possibility for reversals of other cases, such as Obergefell v. Hodges that legalized same-sex marriage.  Curiously he said nothing of the 1967 Loving v. Virginia case that legalized interracial marriage.  (Thomas is currently married to a White chick.)

As upsetting as the Dobbs decision was, I know the case that will galvanize Americans; that is, the decision that – if reversed – will incite a revolution.  It is the one case that will drive Americans into the voting booth more than abortion, education, guns, queers or voting itself – Miller v. California, the 1972 decision that technically legalized pornography.  (Also see United States v. Reidel.) Yes, among all the sentient issues plaguing our modern society, denying people the right to view sexual activity will culminate in a revolution that could rival the collapse of the Roman Empire.  In the mid-1980s, President Ronald Reagan – perhaps still angry about the Miller decision – launched a war on pornography.  His then-Attorney General, Edwin Meese, commissioned associates to investigate the adult film industry under the guise of protecting children, which is indeed a noble effort.  But in reality, Reagan’s self-righteous demeanor drove his efforts to limit free speech; to stifle those who dared to disagree with him.  We saw much of the same two decades ago as critics of President George W. Bush were assailed.  Both extremist conservatives and liberals just don’t like when people have something negative to say about their lifestyles.  The same groups don’t have any problem, though, dictating what’s appropriate for others.  Conservatives, in particular, don’t like anything sexual.  It sends them into epileptic fits.

Regardless I can assure everyone that any U.S. Supreme Court assault on pornography will be taken seriously.  It has a lot to do with finances.  As of 2022, the adult film industry in the U.S. profited about $97 billion.  And that kind of money buys a certain amount of power.

The Reagan Administration failed to shut down pornography in the U.S.  Despite the AIDS epidemic, the adult film industry forged ahead in the 1980s and continued growing.  And I can assure even the most ardent of conservatives can’t stop it.  Then again, many of those same conservatives often view pornographic material – they just won’t admit it.  They really can’t because it would undermine their own limited credibility.

No matter what happens with the High Court, I doubt few other matters will resonate with voters as the X factor.  There are few things more obscene to me than war and unfettered censorship.

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July 15, 2023 · 10:06 PM

Shifted

The U.S. Supreme Court ended its first term of 2023 last month with some stunning decisions – stunning, but not surprising.  A year ago the Court finished with its shocking reversal of the 1973 landmark Roe v. Wade, which had legalized abortion in the United States.  Ending abortion in this country had been a long-standing goal of social and religious conservatives and they finally accomplished that mission.  But this time the Court went further in their swing to the far right by ending affirmative action in college admissions and allowing religion to be used to discriminate.

In Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College, the Court ruled that the admissions programs used by the University of North Carolina and Harvard College violate the Constitution’s equal protection clause (the 14th Amendment), which bars racial discrimination by government entities.  The 14th Amendment has been utilized to undermine entrenched discrimination for decades.  It has manifested its power in such SCOTUS decisions as Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka and Miranda v. Arizona.  Ironically, the Students for Fair Admissions ruling reversed a 20-year-old case, Grutter v. Bollinger, which declared race as a plausible factor in college admissions policies.  Have things really changed for the better in two decades?  All of this also reminds me of the Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, in which a White man, Allan Bakke, sued the University of California Medical School at Davis for refusing to admit him; the school had reserved 16 places in each entering class for qualified ethnic minorities.  Bakke had applied twice to the school and been denied twice, despite having a high GPA and test scores.  SCOTUS ruled that, while race was a qualifying factor in college admissions, the University of California policy at the time, indeed, violated the Constitution’s 14th Amendment.

I have to admit I support their affirmative action decision.  As noble a philosophy as it was, I feel affirmative action has run its course, and – as we march further into the 21st century – it’s time we truly become a color blind society.  Actually it’s way past time.  But, as with campaign promises and many business plans, things look great on paper.  Personally I don’t feel affirmative action has helped me.  It hasn’t hurt me, but it certainly hasn’t helped me.  I never asked for special rights or considerations.  But, like I told a friend years ago, while legislation may have forced the playing field to become level, are all the players on the field playing on the level?

It’s the Creative 303 decision, however, that concerns me the most.  Last year the Supreme Court made perhaps its most controversial decision in decades with the Dobbs ruling that effectively ended the constitutional right to an abortion.  But, in the 2022 Carson v. Makin ruling, the Court chipped even further away at that cherished separation between government and religion, when it declared the state of Maine had violated the constitution when it refused to make public funding available to students attending religious schools.  In general religious institutions don’t pay taxes; therefore, they’ve traditionally been unable to access tax money at either the state or federal level.  The reasoning was practical: anyone who receives government funding should follow certain rules and regulations.  People taking unemployment insurance, for example, have to conduct a minimum number of job searches weekly; otherwise, they can’t receive that money.

In the Creative 303 case, Colorado web site designer Lorie Smith had allegedly refused to design a site for someone planning a same-sex wedding; declaring that it was an affront to her religious beliefs and therefore, violated her First Amendment rights.  It’s similar to another case from Colorado, Masterpiece Cake Shop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, in which Jack C. Phillips, the owner of Masterpiece, refused to bake a wedding cake for a male couple on the grounds that it violated his religious beliefs; he simply didn’t believe in same-gender unions.  The couple, Charlie Craig and David Mullins, filed suit, claiming Phillips was in violation of Colorado’s Anti-Discrimination Act.  The Supreme Court ultimately ruled in Philips’ favor, decreeing that the Colorado statute violated “the State’s duty under the First Amendment not to use hostility toward religion or a religious viewpoint as a basis for laws or regulations.”

But no sooner had the Creative 303 ruling been made than news arose that Smith may have fabricated her initial claim.  The man who supposedly asked her to design a web site for a same-gender wedding states he never worked with her.  Smith, however, cited the man – identified only as “Stewart” – in 2017 court documents and included his phone number and email address.  But “Stewart” says he didn’t even know his name had been invoked in the original lawsuit until a report with “The New Republic” contacted him.

“I was incredibly surprised given the fact that I’ve been happily married to a woman for the last 15 years,” said Stewart, who declined to give his last name for fear of harassment and threats.  He noted that he’s a designer himself and could have created his own web site if necessary.

One of Smith’s lawyers, Kristen Waggoner, insisted Stewart’s name and other information had been submitted to her client’s web site and denied the entire claim had been fabricated.  But she suggested an internet troll had made the request to Smith; adding that’s it occurred with other clients.  Ironically, the aforementioned Jack C. Phillips was also Waggoner’s client.

Regardless, I have to wonder if this revelation doesn’t render the Creative 303 ruling invalid.  Even if an internet troll had made the initial application, Smith’s attorneys should have verified every detail of the case.  That’s what lawyers are supposed to do.

Getting a matter before the U.S. Supreme Court is no small feat; they don’t take on minor traffic infractions.  That’s why so many of their decisions are monumental and can reshape society.  And thus, it’s why people are rightfully concerned about the implications of the Creative 303 edict.  If religious ideology can be the basis for discrimination, who’s to say a business owner can’t refuse to service a prospective client under such a pretense?  Technically businesses have the right to refuse service to anyone, but that’s generally happened only under the most egregious of circumstances.  A bar or nightclub, for example, can refuse to admit someone who’s visibly intoxicated.  I’ve seen signs on doors declaring “no shirt, no shoes, no service”.

Years ago another friend told me I discriminate whenever I choose one food item over another.  “That’s not discrimination,” I told him, “that’s selection.”  But he was a conservative, so I guess I understood why he couldn’t make that distinction.

Still, I certainly hope many Black, Hispanic and queer conservatives are happy with their votes for George W. Bush and Donald Trump.  Despite not winning the popular vote in their respective elections, they were able to place five justices on the U.S. Supreme Court.  That has never happened before in the history of U.S. legal jurisprudence.  All five of those individuals have now set back decades of civil rights advancements.  A truly democratic society is supposed to protect all of its citizens from bigotry and oppression.  I fear we’re doing the opposite in the United States.

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July 30, 2022 · 10:36 PM

Best Quotes of the Week – July 30, 2022

“I do not believe that we made any progress. In fact, I think the party got worse.”

Dale Carpenter, former president of Log Cabin Republicans, a GLBT political group, expressing disappointment about their acceptance within overall Republican Party

For years LCR has tried – and repeatedly failed – to garner the attention of Texas’ Republican Party.

I’ve known a few queer conservatives over the years and was always stunned at how they idolized Ronald Reagan and voted for the likes of George W. Bush and Donald Trump, despite the GOP’s hostility towards them.  So to know that a former LCR operative has essentially admitted defeat is somewhat of a vindication for me.

“Look, we pursue justice without fear or favor.”

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, to NBC News’ Lester Holt, about the possibility former President Donald Trump could be criminally prosecuted for his role in the Capitol Hill riot of January 6, 2021

Garland added, “We intend to hold everyone, anyone who was criminally responsible for the events surrounding January 6, for any attempt to interfere with the lawful transfer of power from one administration to another, accountable.  That’s what we do.”

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July 22, 2022 · 8:40 PM

Next!

“First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist

Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist

Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist

Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew

Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me.”

Martin Niemöller

We’re still in shock here in the U.S.  In just a matter of weeks, the conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court undid decade’s worth of progressive social reforms.  The reversal of Roe vs. Wade last month garnered the most attention, but they didn’t stop with that.

In Vega vs. Tekoh, the High Court ruled that a violation of Miranda rights doesn’t provide a basis for civil damages.  The original Miranda vs. Arizona decision ensured people accused of criminal behavior have the right to legal counsel and to remain silent in the face of police interrogation.  Miranda was decided in line with the U.S. Constitution’s Fifth Amendment, which had already established certain guidelines for addressing criminal procedures.  The Vega ruling now ensures that law enforcement can act with impunity.  I suspect it’s a response to the vitriolic reactions to high-profile police killings over the past…well, several decades; the ‘Black Lives Matter’ protests and all that.  In Vega, the SCOTUS majority noted that, if the original Miranda court intended to create a constitutional right versus a prophylactic rule, it would have definitively declared that immediately upon deciding Miranda.  The 1966 Court knew how to use its words, the current Court essentially declared, and those words used were not “constitutional right.”  See how verbiage can be twisted so easily by academics?

In West Virginia vs. the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Court undercut the latter’s efforts to regulate greenhouse gases.  SCOTUS agreed with Republican-led states and energy companies that the 1970 Clean Air Act gave the EPA too much power over carbon emissions.  The decision was also a strike back against the 2015 Clean Power Plan – an Obama-era policy that targeted adverse climate change.  To environmentalists, it wasn’t surprising that energy conglomerates were adamant in reversing the CPP, as well as the CAA.  But the West Virginia ruling falls in line with the belief of conservatives that climate change is a hoax.  That’s why energy companies overwhelmingly support Republican candidates.  I have to note West Virginia is a top coal producer.  It also ranks as one of the poorest states in the union.

In his statement regarding the Dobbs ruling, Justice Clarence Thomas suggested the Court should revisit other high-profile rulings, including Griswold vs. Connecticut, which declared the legal usage of contraceptives; Lawrence vs. Texas, which struck down anti-sodomy laws; and Obergefell vs. Hodges, which legalized same-sex marriage.  Curiously, he didn’t call for a review of Brown vs. Topeka Board of Education, which declared that racial segregation in schools was unconstitutional or Loving vs. Virginia, which legalized interracial marriage.  I guess this is because overturning these decisions would impact Thomas, a Negro married to a White chick.  It’s amazing how some people have no problems enacting laws that wouldn’t affect them personally.

In the 1983 film “The Star Chamber”, Michael Douglas portrays a relatively young judge who becomes engaged with a group of other jurists who find the legal system has gone awry in favor of criminals and decide to enact vigilante justice to right those perceived wrongs.  They hire assassins to kill certain criminals who have escaped incarceration.  The movie is replete with scenes where highly articulate lawyers help defendants get out of trouble.  In one early scene, Hal Holbrook’s character tells Douglas, “Someone has hidden justice inside the law.”  It’s an attempt to justify the group’s brutal actions.

That’s how I often view the legal system.  Charismatic lawyers prancing around even the most heinous of crimes with carefully-crafted verbiage; a kind of Tolkien-style language only they understand, but something the rest of us have to deal with toiling away in the trenches of reality.  I certainly don’t recommend assassination as a viable resolution to our nation’s political ills.  That’s where the treasured right of voting comes into play.  People need to take their voting rights seriously and understand the significance of not voting.  We’ve seen the fruits of voter apathy in my home state of Texas.  In recent years, the right to vote has come under fire from conservatives.  As with many other rights, this isn’t a surprise.  Conservatives have always tried to suppress voting.  You know…the way totalitarian regimes like Russia have.  I’ve noted more than once that the (fair and legitimate) elections of Barack Obama prompted (mostly White) conservatives to launch their assault on the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.  During their convention last month, the Texas Republican Party called for repeal of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which guarantees the right to vote regardless of race.  They did this because…well, because that’s what conservatives do – at least here in the U.S.  They were quick to abolish fascism in Europe during World War II, but weren’t so eager to do the same at home.

With this in mind, I wonder if many conservative queers who voted for the likes of George W. Bush and Ted Cruz are satisfied with their decisions.  Along with many mainstream right-wingers, some are ecstatic that Roe was overturned.  But now, I hate to see their reactions at the thought of reversing Lawrence or Obergefell.  But the neo-Nazi clowns who have targeted the so-called “liberal agenda” for years are coming for their faggot asses next!  I just hope they’ll be happy sitting in their designer closets polishing their Ronald Reagan Glee Club pins.

If anyone in the U.S. believes democracy is functioning just perfectly and nothing is wrong, they need to consider this: five of the current justices on the Supreme Court were chosen by presidents who did NOT win the popular vote.  George W. Bush didn’t really win the 2000 presidential election and he barely won the 2004 election; yet he was able to appoint two justices – Samuel Alito and John Roberts.  Donald Trump certainly didn’t win the 2016 presidential election (perhaps the most corrupt in U.S. history), but he was able to appoint three justices to the Court: Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney-Barrett.  Gorsuch’s selection came because Republicans refused to grant President Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, the decency of a hearing upon the death of Antonin Scalia in 2016; claiming it was an election year and the next president should choose the nominee.  However, Barrett’s nomination came after the death of Ruth Bader Ginsberg in 2020.  The same band of Republicans who denied Garland a hearing rammed through Barrett’s confirmation without hesitation.

I don’t know if most Americans fully comprehend the significance of the Dobbs decision that overturned Roe.  It could lead to much worse.  But this is what happens when people don’t bother to vote in even the most mundane of elections.  Liberals seem especially reticent to take local races seriously.  I can only recommend everyone concerned about our democracy to make that concerted effort to vote.  I understand how many people feel their votes don’t count, particularly after the 2000 and 2016 presidential elections and all the corruption involved in both.

Yet, democracy is not a natural form of governing.  Humanity is more likely to construct an oligarchy-style system.  In worse case settings, totalitarianism can take root, as it almost did with Donald Trump in the White House.  People need to be wary of the current U.S. Supreme Court and its fascist leanings, disguised as social conservatism.  (Then again, fascism and conservatism are pretty much the same ideology.)

It’s starting with the Roe reversal.  Unless we place more moderates into public office, it will only get worse.

Bottom image: Michael de Adder

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May 21, 2022 · 6:46 AM

Gaffe of the Week – May 21, 2022

“The result is an absence of checks and balances in Russia, and the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq – I mean of Ukraine.”

Former President George W. Bush, in a speech criticizing Russian President Vladimir Putin

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