This just in: I just read a Washington Post Opinion that warned Trump was definitely going to be the Republican candidate for president in 2024.

I find this terrifying. Not because Trump is a disaster (he is) but because people vote for him. I recently saw a news show where the host was interviewing people on a tour of what was once Mayberry RFD. They were trying to reconnect with a past that they loved. A small town sheriff (Andy Griffin) and a small town of white, Christian people. The Apple Pie of Americana. When interviewed, they all were quick to say they loved their country. Then they continued talking. Turns out they think the 2020 election was stolen from Trump, citing one broadly discredited claim after another.

That is what I find terrifying. There are those that believe Trump was sent by God to lead us into the white supremist future where Christianity and the Taliban are indistinguishable and Putin only wants what is best for us.

I think I may be biased so I’m going to make an honest attempt to lay out what appears to be the national Republican platform:

1. Elections are all rigged. The evidence for this claim seems to rely entirely on the fact that Republicans keep losing.
2. Keep non-white people out of the country.
3. Base the government on the Christian bible (aka the White Taliban)
4. Fight COVID by simply denying it exists
5. Don’t teach black history because it makes white people feel guilty.
6. Ban LGBTQ because they fear they may be gay
7. Disregard ALL economic theory because it slows the self-enrichment of congress and their donors.
8. Fight Climate change by simply denying it exists
9. Keep non-Republicans from voting.
10. Pander to the single issue voter. For example, claim to be anti-abortion and you can get all of the Evangelical votes.
11. Discourage higher education because you don’t want people questioning your actions.
12. Get out of NATO because it make Russia happy.
13. Let Turkey kill our allies the Kurds because Trump has hotels in Turkey
14. Get out of trade agreements with non-white countries.
15. Feed the military war machine because they have the biggest lobbyist budget
16. Scrap all public healthcare because private healthcare has the second biggest lobbyist budget.

I guess that is enough of that. I don’t see any redeeming values in any of these and yet, all of them are undeniably Republican positions.

Republicans, when faced with the above issues, will tell you that its up to the States to address these issues. You might recall that States’ Rights was the South’s justification for the Civil War. That is their cover story even today so they can pretend it was not about slavery.

If this list works for you, great! Vote Republican.

It doesn’t work for me so…

It ‘s time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim

This just in: The slow pace of progress is one of the top problems with our government.

In WWII, the aircraft carrier Yorktown entered Pearl Harbor needing about 6 months worth of repairs. It was so damaged that just getting rid of it was an option. However, in 4 days, it was back at sea, launching aircraft. This one event was a hidden turning point in the war in the Pacific. The Japanese saw the Yorktown and mistook it for the U.S. fleet since they were certain it couldn’t be the heavily damage Yorktown. This made the Japanese go in one direction while our actual fleet moved in for the kill. You may be familiar with this as The Battle of Midway.

The point is that we made a decision to do 6 months of work on an aircraft carrier in just 4 days. We had to do it so we did it.

As a country, or even as a species, we are capable of great things. All we need to do is make up our mind to do it.

This long preamble brings me to the topic of “pace.”

Let’s start with immigration.

If you were in South America and wanted to come to the United States, would your (a) file your paperwork and wait 10 years or (b) cross the border illegally. These are basically your two decisions. Our immigration system is so slow that it took my wife 2 years to get a green card AFTER we were married.

We need immigrants. We need the diversity they offer. We need the labor they offer. We need them at every level of our economy. Today there are about 2.5 million more job openings than there are job seekers. These openings represent lost economic growth.

To fix this, all we need to do is streamline the immigration procedure. Democrats aren’t really interested in fixing this because when Republicans are in control, Dems can blame them for being inhumane. Republicans don’t want to fix this because immigrants aren’t white.

What about White Collar crime?

Congress is filled with inside traders or people that misused campaign funds. If they were prosecuted quickly, this type of behavior would end. Instead, we get, “We are looking into it.” Trump commits one crime after another. He is personally responsible for tens of thousands of deaths ranging from the Kurds to the people next door that died needlessly from COVID. And what do we get? “We are looking into it.”

The slow pace of immigration causes immigration problems.

The slow pace of justice fuels injustice.

These are problems we can solve if we chose to. Right now, we are not choosing to.

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim

This just in: I took my dog in to get a couple of vaccines today.

He didn’t say, “Hey! What in the hell do you think you are doing?”

He didn’t say this for a couple of reasons, the first being, that he is a dog. The second is that he naturally assumes that there is a reason for this and I’m the expert at what is best for his health.

I routinely take my dogs in for maintenance. I do this because I’m a good dog parent and I want them to live long and healthy lives.

However, today’s vaccine was not for this reason. Today’s vaccine was “mandated” by the kennel where he goes for play dates and sleepovers.

They say, “If you want your dog to come into our environment, he/she must have the following vaccines.”

Now, what I don’t do is say, “Hey you communist! What are you trying to do – take away my dog’s right to not wear a mask?” I don’t say this because I’m not a Republican and I also already understand quite well why they want my dog vaccinated.

I’m sure they want him to be healthy but that is not the reason.

What they want to do is ensure all of the other dogs will not get sick because my unvaccinated dog brought something into the kennel.

I understand this. You understand this.

Why don’t QAnon, Republican, Anti-vaxxers understand this.

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim

This just in: After careful consideration, I have come to 2 conclusions. (1) I think the best evidence for the existence of God is that we seem to need for him/her/it to exist and (2) There is equal evidence that God exists and that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump.

“Heresy!” you say. “Burn him at the stake!”

I may be wrong here and feel free to change my mind. In fact, I want you to change my mind. But I doubt that you can. Not because I am stubborn but because the evidence simply does not exist.

You can point at a blade of grass and say, “Surely this exists because God made it so.” Perhaps you are right but I think its more likely that you think that God made that blade of grass so you can grasp onto something that shows he exists. The fact in that they blade of grass is an inevitable result of physics.

There are all kinds of fables and “eye witness” accounts of God doing this or that. There are far more instances of people taking these “events” and interpreting them in vastly different manners in order to support a certain perspective. The fact is that Jesus was “elected” to the position as “Son of God”. Look it up. Hell was invented to increase tithings.

It all comes down to this…how do QAnon and Christians explain the unexplainable? It’s either with “That’s what they want you to believe,” or “God works in mysterious ways.”

Hey, QAnon (aka Republican), how do you explain that no evidence of voter fraud has been found?

QAnon (aka Republican), “That’s just what they want you to believe.”

See how easy that was to justify an unjustifiable position?

Let’s try another…

Hey, Christian, how do you explain why God allows a gunmen to do mass killings at a school?

Christian: “God works in mysterious ways.” or “God is testing your faith.”

Testing my faith??!! So he wants to know if I believe in him? Shouldn’t he already know that? He does? He just wants to to use my free will because he’s good guy…one that will smite me if I don’t use my free will in the way he wants me to? Really? People believe this?

Don’t get me wrong…well, if you think that I think QAnon is made up of idiots then you completely get me.

However, if you think I don’t believe in a god, you would be wrong. I just think that an entity capable of creating the universe has no need to act like an old jealous white man with low self esteem. And he/she certainly doesn’t need to work in “mysterious ways”.

My observation is that people that are hard-core belief system Christians are just like QAnon people. They are the same in two ways. First, both believe what they want to believe even in the complete absence of supporting evidence. Secondly, both are by far, members of the Republican Party.

Republicans governs with fear; just like organized religions. They do this because it works.

Alas…I find this greatly disappointing. The universe and whatever created it are so much more vastly interesting and inspiring that we could possibly imagine. It takes a small person indeed to use this for the spread of fear and an increase of control.

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim

This just in: In the book Catch 22, Yossarian, a pilot that is terrified of flying in WWII is told that “So long as the front, represented by a strand of yarn on a board, is below a certain latitude, they will continue to bomb.” So Yossarian gets up in the middle of the night and simply moves the line of yarn. Problem solved.

A couple of days ago, the Texas governor performed a similar miracle. When confronted with the fact that the new anti-abortion law does not allow women that are raped to have abortions, he solved the problem by saying, and I’m not making this up, “Texas will eliminate all rapes in the state.”

I don’t know how he will move this “strand of yard.” Will they castrate every single male of “rape age” in the state? Will they rename rape as “Boys will be boys” or “You know she wanted it” and thus…no more rape.

Republicans do this a lot. It’s sort of like putting on Dorthey’s ruby slippers and then tapping the heals together as you make a wish.

Here are a few examples:

1. We are preparing evidence of voter fraud and you will see it in…2 weeks.
2. When we give billionaires a tax break, the economy will grow 5%
3. Right now we are preparing a tax cut for the middle class (Trump said this, surprising everyone in Congress since they had no idea what he was talking about)
4. Obama will take away your guns.
5. Biden will turn us all into Socialists
6. Climate change is a Chinese hoax
7. A marauding band of women and children are preparing to cross the southern border to take away your jobs and rape your women (it will always be called rape unless a white male does it).
8. Trump won the election…by a lot
9. The pandemic is a hoax…or over…or nearly over…or Bill Gates blah, blah, blah…
10. Aside from the $8 trillion dollars of overspending under Trump, we balanced the budget.
11. We need to die in the sand overseas so that the terrorist won’t come over here and rape.

This list can go on and on.

I often think the Republican position is based on Brandolini’s Law, also know and the Bullshit Asymmetry Principle. It goes like this: The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude larger than to produce it. In other words, they use very little energy to just make stuff up knowing that the opposition will never have enough energy to set the record straight in every case.

Stated another way: It is easier to fool people than to convince them they have been fooled. This is why Faux News is successful.

Republican officials also benefit from voters that grab onto the first thing that they hear that they “want” to be true and will not hear anything beyond that. You could say, “horse de-worming medicine works to cure horse worms” and they will stop hearing anything after “horse de-worming medicine works.”

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim

This just in: Today, I thought I would list some of the benefits and downsides of the COVID pandemic.

The first, and easily the biggest, downside is that the dirty underbelly of America has been exposed. There are those that feed misinformation for no reason other than to watch in glee as the gullible rush to the trough to eat their fill. “Bill Gates has tracking devices in the vaccine!” they say. In response, millions of Americans that are carrying cell phones which track their every movement and thought say, “I’m gonna get me some horse de-wormer to protect my freedoms.”

A win has been my ability to adapt my job so that I don’t have to travel so much. I went from flying 120,000 miles a year to ZERO and yet, my business never faltered.

A loss has been the need to wear masks nearly everywhere. I understand and support the need to wear masks, constantly wash my hands, maintain social distance and get vaccinated. However, I don’t have to like it.

A win was the lack of traffic. I could drive through downtown San Francisco faster than I could walk the same route. This was new. However, this is starting to fade as traffic resumes.

A loss is the isolation from each other. This ranges from isolation from my neighbors to empty seats at the Olympics.

A win is the newfound joy of things I once took for granted. Sitting at an outside cafe sipping coffee and watching the world go by…what a great thing!

A loss, not one I experienced directly, is the loss of income for those people in jobs that were curtailed or completely eliminated because of the pandemic.

A win is my house. We re-did everything. 2 years ago we were thinking about moving; having had enough of the wildfire smoke and power shutdowns. However, now the house looks like new and we don’t plan on leaving any time soon. There is a show called Love It or List It. We decided to Love It.

A loss was I didn’t get to see my family. My only grandson is now 2 years old and I haven’t seen him since he still had that new car smell. At one point I hadn’t seen my mom for 18 months. We missed a Christmas and a Thanksgiving. My wife didn’t see her family for nearly 2 years.

A win is my weight. When I was traveling a lot, I was eating out a lot. Since the pandemic, I’m mostly home where my wife keeps an eye on my diet. I’ve lost about 10 pounds.

And finally I circle back to the biggest loss, that slice of the American public that “did Facebook research” and determined vaccines are dangerous, elections are fraudulent and any other bit of conspiracy theory nonsense that crosses their biased news feeds.

This “biggest loss” is the worst because it is not a product of the pandemic. The pandemic merely allowed us to “look behind the curtain”. There, we found a mirror and what we saw…was disappointing and…persistent. We will still be this…thing….when the pandemic is far in our rear view mirror.

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim

This just in: I struggled with the title of this post. Part of me wanted to point out the close partnership between Republicans and misinformation. Part of me wanted to point out their lack of ANY platform. In the end, I decided Hypocrisy is their closest and most accurate descriptor.

Let’s start with abortion. My opinion is that they should be allowed. I have 3 main reasons for this: (1) The Constitution says so, (2) Women bear the burden and it is their body and (3) Making them illegal has no impact on the total number of abolitions; it just increases the number of “alley” abortions which puts the woman’s life in danger.

The Republican view: God made me do it. God wants me to be against abortions because he loves life. God loves life so I love life. Although I like freedoms, I only like them when they impact me. “me” being a white, male Republican legislature in Texas.

The sanctity of life and the value of freedoms is their rallying cry; as if the other party doesn’t like these things. “Vote Republican because we love puppies!!” tells their sheep that to not vote Republican is to not like puppies.

The sanctity of life ends, apparently, at birth. At that instant, the Republican Party mantra becomes, “Keep your lazy hands off of my stuff!” Speaking of abortion, the new Texas law prohibits abortion for rape. Texas justifies this by saying, “We will end all rape in Texas.” (note: Texas leads the nation in rape cases) They say, “You have 6 weeks to get an abortion” apparently unaware that 90% of women are unaware that they are pregnant at 6 weeks.

The appreciation of liberties ends once you want something different from what they want. You want same sex marriage, they will legislate against you. You want gay rights? They will legislate against you. You want to end the pandemic by using science? They will legislate against you. You want to save the planet for our children’s children? They will legislate against you. You want everyone to have the right to vote easily? They will legislate against you. You want fiscal responsibility? They will sell you on the scam known as Trickle Down economics. You want to get out of endless wars? They will sell you fear.

You want the truth? The Republican Party will give you propaganda.

I was watching Morning Joe this morning and they had on the Georgia Lt. Governor, a Republican. He actually said the following, “Americans support Republicans on 9 out of 10 issues.” There are two things that are really weird about this: (1) I can’t name a single Republican issue unless its pro-guns and anti-abortion and (2) I can’t think of a single issue that Americans favor the Republican position over a Democrat position.

One last note on this abortion issue. I am not a woman but I believe that a woman that chooses to have an abortion does so after giving it an agonizing mental debate. It is not, “I think I’ll go buy some shoes and then get an abortion on the way home.” It is not easy and it is a decision that they know they will carry with them their whole lives. I trust them to make a decision that is right for them.

I trust them to make the decision that is right for them.

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim

This just in:  Today I thought that instead of saying what I think is the case, I’ll instead make a list of things I don’t believe to be true.

1. I don’t believe the earth is flat.
2. I don’t believe God is jealous or has any human traits that we humans have assigned to him.
3. I don’t believe the governor of Texas cares about abortion.
4. I don’t believe the governor of Florida cares about stopping the spread of COVID .
5. I don’t believe that God acts in mysterious ways.
6. I don’t believe that universal healthcare is beyond the ability of our country to implement.
7. I don’t believe Bill Gates is trying to put tracking chips in me (but that would be very cool).
8. I don’t believe sacrificial virgins help crops to grow if you throw them into a volcano (the virgins, not the crops)
9. I don’t believe that global warming is a Chinese plot.
10. I don’t believe that Trickle-down economics is anything more than a scam
11. I don’t believe that social media in its current form is healthy for America.
12. I don’t believe new election laws are meant to do anything other than keep people for voting against those that are making the laws.
13. I don’t believe in hell
14. I don’t believe pharmaceutical companies are as interested in curing things as they are in creating marketable ways to treat things.
15. I don’t believe any flavor is better than butterscotch in the pudding hierarchy.
16. I don’t believe that rich preachers on TV believe in what they are selling
17. I don’t believe the moon landing was faked
18. I don’t believe marijuana is a gateway drug
19. I don’t believe that GOD cares at all if you have an abortion, masturbate or fail to pray to him
20. I don’t believe that Brett Kavanaugh belongs on the Supreme Court
21. I don’t believe the furniture store Scandinavian Designs is honest with its customers.
22. I don’t believe Donald Trump is anything other than a con man.
23. I don’t believe the United States military needs to be as big as it is.
24. I don’t believe the Republican Party is not racist at its core
25. I don’t believe that corporations are people

Actually, this is harder than I thought.

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim

This just in: I see little difference between Texas and the Taliban.

With the Taliban, women are controlled by white men that run around armed to the teeth. The only difference between this and Texas is that the Taliban insist their women wear masks. Also, Texas men ride around in F150’s sporting confederate flags while the Taliban has a mix of used Toyotas and giant, indestructable vehicles left behind by the U.S. army.

I have a great Idea for a new show on the History channel. It will be based on the new Texas law banning abortions. I will call it Abortion Bounty Hunters.

Texas makes it a crime similar to terrorism if you get an abortion at 6 weeks or later. Note that most pregnant women are not even aware that they are pregnant at this stage. Anyway…if you are a private citizen, you can get money if you report someone getting an abortion or helping them get an abortion.

Now, the smart Abortion Bounty Hunter will not go after the women. Why? Because making abortions illegal does not lessen the number of abortions; it just makes people get them in alleys where the mortality rate is significantly higher than at a clinic. So, don’t go after the women because they may not live to pay up.

Instead, go after the person that gave them a ride to the abortion alley. Or, go after the person that lent them the phone to call Uber for a ride to abortion alley. Or go after a friend that may have said, “If I were you I would get an abortion.” Each of these can net you $10,000. Ka-Ching!!

On a completely unrelated topic…the governor of Florida is an idiot. In that state, any business or organization that asks for proof of vaccination will be fined $5,000. So, want to keep your patrons safe from anti-vaxxers? Only let people in the door that you have actually seen getting the vaccine.

I feel another History Channel show coming on…maybe something like Anti-Vaxxer/Anti-masker Vigilantes of the Everglades.

I can’t make this stuff up.

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim