The Long Road Out

 The idiot in the White House believes that it's a good idea for 17-year old kids to load up with weapons and drive to minority communities to defend property.  He believes that such a kid, after a two-hour drive filled with intentionality, has a right to a self-defense claim when he unloads his weapons into a crowd.  So, I want to make it absolutely clear:  you won't even let 17 year olds into our military or secret police.  Now, without any training, you want them on the streets, near schools, and on the fringes of agitated citizens? What the serious fuck.  You, Donald Trump, are a dangerous accessory to murder.  Here's a baseline principle: no teenager should have access to weapons.  This would reduce the teen suicide rate in the United States by half in an instant. It would reduce the number of women murdered by young boyfriends. And it would save our Democracy.  As has always been the case in the United States, people who reject the gove...

Bright-shiny-object of the second: Guiliani says truth is not truth.   Every since Rudy reemerged from the dustbins of celebrity, he's been short a few brain cells.  But, since he's a celebrity, he can't stop sharing his impairment. Recall that his first effort to ride on Trump's celebrity machine was his insipid and manic assertion that he represented Don in the Stormy Daniels' non-disclosure fee.  It's hard to know.   Trump had corrected Guiliani three times by tweet in the first 24 hours of Rudy's cool new client engagement (has the White House actually written any checks to Rudy?   Wow, that's pretty low value for taxpayer dollars.   He's senile!).  I've never loved the Guiliani brand.   Most people forget about his admirable U.S. Attorney career where he really did get some bad guys (remember the Pizza Connection RICO trial?   No one outside Guiliani's office ever used RICO as effectively since, as the Galahad's sword it was i...

Colin Kaepernik's career was ruined because he sat down twice for the National Anthem two years ago. Trump joined in on the debate back then--if the mob has an idea, Trump will repeat it on Twitter. So, the NFL owners had a problem:  highly paid players they needed to get rid of.   Two years later, they decide on a policy to stop this.   As of today, every one must stand if they're on the field when the music starts. Kind of like a junior high school dance!  In a gracious bow to free speech, the NFL decided dissenters can avoid the embarrassment of participating in a silly ceremony they don't support by staying in the locker room. I love the thought of an empty playing field once the recorded bugles start to pound.  Build some bigger locker rooms, guys--it's gonna be CROWDED in there! Here's Roger Goodell, summing up the wisdom of two years of what must have been painfully stupid discussions among a whole lot of rich-ish white men: "We want people to ...

Most U.S. citizens don't know that France occupied Mexico in the 1860's.   In fact, they probably assumed that Spain was somehow in control, if they've thought about it at all.   True, Spain was the main colonial bully, from the 1500's until, a fter eleven years of war (1810–21), New Spain became the sovereign nation of Mexico, with the signing of the  Treaty of Córdoba . A brief period of monarchy (1821–23)  was followed by the founding of the Republic of Mexico, established under a federal constitution in 1824. That left free reign to the US to attack Mexico in 1846.   We didn't really want to occupy the country like the Spanish--we just wanted to take half of the land, which we did in 1848 via the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.  So much for the Mexican-American War, and the glory of San Antonio and Davey Crocker and Sam Houston.  Now we have Beverly Hills and Phoenix! So, 1848 passes.   A half-sized Mexico continues, initiating a series of li...